The plot, set in Rome in AD 90, involves, amongst other aspects of Roman life: an unpaid bar bill; a missing will and codicil; a rabbit farm; an orchard planted variously with walnuts, apricots and cherries; freed slaves; suspicious deaths; and feuding families with labyrinthine family trees.[1][3] Before publication, the author wrote: "The joke of this plot is that it is impossible to summarise".[4] It takes place on the Aventine and Caelian hills and at the Forum Romanum.
The cover of the first UK hardback edition shows a pair of shears against a mosaic showing a rabbit.[1] The cover of the first American edition shows a woman holding a large dagger behind her back, and an armoured Roman soldier, inside a building.[2]
Writing in The Globe and Mail, Margaret Cannon called the novel "as light as air and as witty and amusing as Davis’s finest Falco books of yore".[5]Publishers Weekly wrote that it was "more low-key than past entries, but no less gripping",[6] while Kirkus Reviews called it "dark mystery encased in a rich portrait of ancient Rome."[7] The Historical Novel Society also gave a favourable review.[8]
