If you can tell a lot about a book by its cover, then it’s clear that Caligula sets out to be a mainstream accessible Roman thriller, and on those terms it succeeds enjoyably, if not spectacularly. The title is somewhat misleading, as while this is a book about the court of the Caligula, and has a few chapters from his perspective, it’s mainly a book about the slave Rufus, who is plucked from obscurity to serve as the keeper of the Emperor’s elephant. Rufus is dragged in to the courtly intrigues, murderous plots and vicious whims of his Emperor, and in Jackson’s rewriting of history, is present for Caligula’s untimely end.

The author has not made any effort to challenge the traditional picture of Caligula as a hedonist, capable of incest and murder, cruelty and avarice – his court is a depraved and dangerous place to be. Rufus finds himself uncomfortably close to the centre of things, thanks to his responsibility for the Imperial pachyderm, and along with his friend, the gladiator Cupido, is drawn in to the deadly schemes of the head of Caligula’s bodyguard, as well as the freedman Narcissus, right-hand to the Emperor’s uncle Claudius, and many other intriguers. It all gets quite convoluted at times, but it reaches a suitably adrenaline-fuelled conclusion with the death of the tyrant.

Caligula is written in a no-nonsense style that doesn’t interfere with some taut plotting and a driving storyline – although it’s set over several years in the life of the court, it doesn’t meander. While the prose style won’t set the world on fire, it also manages to completely avoid the kind of wince-inducing cliches that can mar otherwise effective thrillers of all kinds. Simon Scarrow has made a very good career out of writing Roman novels that are compelling yet delivered with similarly workmanlike prose, and anyone who has enjoyed his Macro and Cato books, or Conn Iggulden’s Emperor series, is likely to gain considerable satisfaction from Caligula – a very solid debut indeed.

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