The Fast and the Furies: A tale of Chariot Races, Politics, and Mysteries – both Womanly and Occult!

The long-awaited sequel in the Togas, Daggers, and Magic series in now available for pre-orders on Amazon!

What starts as a curse on the people’s sacred institution of chariot races, soon spirals out of control. From women’s mysteries and place in public affairs, to the whole fabric of politics and society itself.

Felix, dressed in a toga and armed with a dagger, is neither a traditional detective nor a traditional magician – but something in between. Whenever there is a foul business of bad magic, Felix is hired to sniff out the truth. What starts as curses by rabid fans soon involves everyone from politicians to organized crime, and Felix must explore the mysteries of secret cults and of the place of women in society. Now he must separate fact from superstition – a hard task in a world where the old gods still roam the earth.

In Victrix is set in a fantasy world. The city of Egretia borrows elements from a thousand years of ancient Roman culture, from the founding of Rome to the late empire, mixed with a judicious amount of magic. This is a story of a cynical, hardboiled detective dealing with anything from daily life to the old forces roaming the world.

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Harry Turtledove, Science Fiction’s Master of Alternate History, had this to say about the novel:

Assaph Mehr’s Egretia is Rome as the Romans themselves imagined it to be. Magic really works. Curses curse, love philtres create love, oracles do predict the future, and on and on.  The genuine Romans enacted laws against magic not because they thought it was a fraud but because they thought it wasn’t, and feared what it would do if widely practiced.

Throw in the late Republic’s baroque and richly corrupt electoral system, a kidnapping or two, love affairs, bad guys, some good guys who are just about as bad as the baddies, and a coctus (hardboiled, to you) detective who knows all the angles and how to play them as well as any master of geometry, and you’ve got quite a book.  I enjoyed it a lot.  I expect you will, too.