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John the Eunuch #3
Three for a Letter
It's 539 AD, and John the Lord Chamberlain finds his investigations hampered by squabbling courtiers, servants with social ambitions, an eccentric host, and an egotistic inventor―not to mention a herd of prophesying goats and a protective whale. The Mithran Anatolius and the excubitor captain Felix only add to John's worries when they fall under the spell of two ambitious women. Can the trio avoid Theodora's wrath as they work to protect a child and stop a heartless killer? Does the solution lie within the villa where all have assembled, back in Constantinople, or in some other world altogether?
384 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2001
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62 people want to read
About the author
Mary Reed
28Ìýbooks24ÌýfollowersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name.
Mary Reed and Eric Mayer began writing together in 1992. They have contributed to a number of anthologies such as Royal Whodunnits, MammothBook of Historical Whodunnits and Mammoth Book of Shakespearean Detectives, as well as to Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine. They have also published several short stories set in and around the 6th century Constantinople court of Emperor Justinian I as well as four (to date) novels about their protagonist John the Eunuch, Lord Chamberlain to the emperor. The series was listed as one of four Best Little-Known Series in Booklist Magazine in 2003, and a Greek edition of the first novel, One For Sorrow, appeared in late 2002. They live in Pennsylvania.
Mary Reed and Eric Mayer began writing together in 1992. They have contributed to a number of anthologies such as Royal Whodunnits, MammothBook of Historical Whodunnits and Mammoth Book of Shakespearean Detectives, as well as to Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine. They have also published several short stories set in and around the 6th century Constantinople court of Emperor Justinian I as well as four (to date) novels about their protagonist John the Eunuch, Lord Chamberlain to the emperor. The series was listed as one of four Best Little-Known Series in Booklist Magazine in 2003, and a Greek edition of the first novel, One For Sorrow, appeared in late 2002. They live in Pennsylvania.
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
January 20, 2013
Rating: 3* of five
The Book Description: High jinx in the imperial court mixes with lowlife in Constantinople's mean streets...
"If the perfect historical mystery is one that uses the past to let us see the present from a new angle, then this is darned close to being the perfect historical mystery."--Booklist (starred review for Two for Joy)
It is 539 AD and as the reconquest of Italy draws toward its close, a pair of eight-year old twins descended from the last Ostrogothic king have become valuable pawns in Emperor Justinian's plans to restore the glory of Rome. Unfortunately, during the performance of a play at a banquet honoring the two young diplomatic hostages, death makes an entrance and claims one brother.
Then Empress Theodora's favorite mime vanishes and John, Lord Chamberlain to Justinian, is ordered to find both the missing mime and the murderer.
In this third John the Eunuch novel, his investigations are hampered by squabbling courtiers, servants harboring social ambitions, an eccentric host, and an egotistic inventor, not to mention the complications posed by a herd of prophesying goats and a protective whale. His friends the Mithran Anatolius and the excubitor captain Felix only add to John's worries when they fall under the spell of two ambitious women. Can the trio avoid Theodora's wrath as they work to protect a child and stop a heartless killer? It is uncertain whether the solution lies within the villa where all have assembled or back in Constantinople--or in some other world altogether.
My Review: I was robbed! Hours and hours of my life, robbed from me as John and Anatolius careen from pillar to post and do very little of any interest! I was subjected to the drear and dull prattlings of an eight-year-old with an overactive imagination, a poor sense of self-preservation, and a somewhat appalling callousness! I want those eyeblinks back!
Characters are summoned forth, do next to nothing, and vertiginously disappear. Some amazing coincidences are mooted, and then dismissed, and then lo and behold come back again as faits accomplis. Oh the humanity, he said, as the Constantinopolitan Hindenburg burns.
So Theodora, Imperial Wench of the First Water, is getting no image burnishment here, and one wonders why the authors don't do more with her. At the moment, she's a cardboard cut-out of a mean girl. My long-term interest in a mystery series is bound up in the characters the author(s) develop for me to invest in and follow with interest. John the Eunuch is interesting, but the other players are becoming tiresome. Reduced by a vastly overcomplicated plot with more coincidences than even Shakespeare would feel comfortable perpetrating on his miserable, long-suffering audiences to broad-strokes walk-ons, Felix (the equivalent of the police lieutenant all detectives know) and Anatolius (well-placed and wealthy young sidekick) come off as boring one-note lech-boys; Hypatia (salvaged serving girl) as a cipher; and Peter (wise old fool/servant to John) as a foolish old man. The suspects, too numerous to enumerate, don't take shape at all. Theodora, see above. Eeeaaarrrgh!
So why three stars, with this litany of whinges and bitches? For this line:
Fifteen hundred years on is a looong finally, but permaybehaps it's coming to be. I live in hope that it is true, that my shining City on a Hill of Jesuslessness is at last in sight.
In the meantime, the series bought itself one more shot. One. And it had better count.
The Book Description: High jinx in the imperial court mixes with lowlife in Constantinople's mean streets...
"If the perfect historical mystery is one that uses the past to let us see the present from a new angle, then this is darned close to being the perfect historical mystery."--Booklist (starred review for Two for Joy)
It is 539 AD and as the reconquest of Italy draws toward its close, a pair of eight-year old twins descended from the last Ostrogothic king have become valuable pawns in Emperor Justinian's plans to restore the glory of Rome. Unfortunately, during the performance of a play at a banquet honoring the two young diplomatic hostages, death makes an entrance and claims one brother.
Then Empress Theodora's favorite mime vanishes and John, Lord Chamberlain to Justinian, is ordered to find both the missing mime and the murderer.
In this third John the Eunuch novel, his investigations are hampered by squabbling courtiers, servants harboring social ambitions, an eccentric host, and an egotistic inventor, not to mention the complications posed by a herd of prophesying goats and a protective whale. His friends the Mithran Anatolius and the excubitor captain Felix only add to John's worries when they fall under the spell of two ambitious women. Can the trio avoid Theodora's wrath as they work to protect a child and stop a heartless killer? It is uncertain whether the solution lies within the villa where all have assembled or back in Constantinople--or in some other world altogether.
My Review: I was robbed! Hours and hours of my life, robbed from me as John and Anatolius careen from pillar to post and do very little of any interest! I was subjected to the drear and dull prattlings of an eight-year-old with an overactive imagination, a poor sense of self-preservation, and a somewhat appalling callousness! I want those eyeblinks back!
Characters are summoned forth, do next to nothing, and vertiginously disappear. Some amazing coincidences are mooted, and then dismissed, and then lo and behold come back again as faits accomplis. Oh the humanity, he said, as the Constantinopolitan Hindenburg burns.
So Theodora, Imperial Wench of the First Water, is getting no image burnishment here, and one wonders why the authors don't do more with her. At the moment, she's a cardboard cut-out of a mean girl. My long-term interest in a mystery series is bound up in the characters the author(s) develop for me to invest in and follow with interest. John the Eunuch is interesting, but the other players are becoming tiresome. Reduced by a vastly overcomplicated plot with more coincidences than even Shakespeare would feel comfortable perpetrating on his miserable, long-suffering audiences to broad-strokes walk-ons, Felix (the equivalent of the police lieutenant all detectives know) and Anatolius (well-placed and wealthy young sidekick) come off as boring one-note lech-boys; Hypatia (salvaged serving girl) as a cipher; and Peter (wise old fool/servant to John) as a foolish old man. The suspects, too numerous to enumerate, don't take shape at all. Theodora, see above. Eeeaaarrrgh!
So why three stars, with this litany of whinges and bitches? For this line:
John did not press {the suspect} further. It had struck to him on more than one occasion that the Christians' rigid insistence on their god's exclusive sway, so at odds with human nature, would finally prove to be their undoing.(p317, hardcover edition)
Fifteen hundred years on is a looong finally, but permaybehaps it's coming to be. I live in hope that it is true, that my shining City on a Hill of Jesuslessness is at last in sight.
In the meantime, the series bought itself one more shot. One. And it had better count.
April 17, 2016
Three down and not so sure about reading further into the series. Very strange plot that had more than a healthy dose of impenetrable threads. One almost wants to continue reading to discover when John the Eunuch will meet the end Theodora the Empress plans for him. What a mix of disasters in this one, what with automatons gone mad, earthquakes, fortune-telling goats...oh my!
June 14, 2020
John is attending a feast in honor of two youth heirs to the Italian throne at the home of Anatolius' uncle outside of Constantinople. Justinian is not there but Theodora is and when one of the children is killed and the mime disappears John is forced to investigate and keep watch over the remaining girl heir.
She is precocious and a handful, preferring to hide and visit the nearby residents, including an old mariner and the priestess who reads the goats messages on goat island.
The heiress has guardians and governesses but the estate is as much in turmoil as the court with intrigue murder and thievery.
Only one aspect seemed forced, that Anatolius would not remember a hidden underground retreat that plays an important part.
Very interesting with information on writings, the theater and straw man festivities.
She is precocious and a handful, preferring to hide and visit the nearby residents, including an old mariner and the priestess who reads the goats messages on goat island.
The heiress has guardians and governesses but the estate is as much in turmoil as the court with intrigue murder and thievery.
Only one aspect seemed forced, that Anatolius would not remember a hidden underground retreat that plays an important part.
Very interesting with information on writings, the theater and straw man festivities.
September 6, 2017
Moving out of the big city and in to the countryside makes for a good change of scenery, but even though the story starts with the violent and bloody death of a child the whole thing is surprisingly flat and unengaging. Searching for a malevolent, or not so malevolent dwarf (who knows) is not all that interesting, the automatons strangely hard to phantom (even though they might be historically accurate, or there abouts, once again who knows) and in the end, when all the threads come together, the solution is so weird and unbelievably out there it hurts your eyes. I mean... Just take that business with the goats! If it wasn't for the disclosure thingy I would rave on about it for half an hour. But the fact remains. Speed reading was the only way to shorten the pain.
June 11, 2016
I confess to a certain fascination with eunuchs as a class of people found in many cultures for thousands of years before vanishing abruptly in the twentieth century. It's a topic that aligns with my other interests in gender and sexuality and how these things are defined by different societies and epochs. There is so little known about eunuchs as human beings and I sometimes wonder about how they saw themselves (as individuals and as a group), how they saw the world, how they lived, and how they dealt with and processed their experiences.
This is why I find myself rather disappointed so far in this particular series. It's well-written with great attention to historic detail. The authors obviously did their research and are creative in coming up with mysteries for John to solve. But John as a character mostly comes across as a normal guy who's survived some shit. If anything, he reminds me of Peter Decker as another hardened detective with a wartime military background and a minority religion at odds with mainstream society. I was hoping for some more imagination about how being a eunuch (and former slave) is different from being any other man in 6th-century Constantinople. Maybe it's explored more in later books?
This is why I find myself rather disappointed so far in this particular series. It's well-written with great attention to historic detail. The authors obviously did their research and are creative in coming up with mysteries for John to solve. But John as a character mostly comes across as a normal guy who's survived some shit. If anything, he reminds me of Peter Decker as another hardened detective with a wartime military background and a minority religion at odds with mainstream society. I was hoping for some more imagination about how being a eunuch (and former slave) is different from being any other man in 6th-century Constantinople. Maybe it's explored more in later books?
January 15, 2010
This one was just okay. Not as good as the first two...I found myself skimming a lot of sections. I just never seemed to get engaged in the story or the characters and it seemed to take forever for it to play out. However, it was a good mystery and I never figured out whodunnit ahead of time.
April 14, 2010
STILL enjoying this series even though I don't like reading about religion and I'm not fond of the time period 500AD. Interesting mysteries and characters - time to order #4!
June 7, 2013
Love the characters in this series
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
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