One week to solve a murder. Londinium, 83 AD. Vibius Maecenas, spy for Emperor Domitian, lies on an underground altar ... his throat slit to the spinal chord. One week to stop a civil war. Arcturus, the governor's doctor and sometime investigator, must find out who butchered him—and why—before Agricola and all of Britannia are plunged into civil war with Rome. He'd also like to know where the blonde fits in ... Welcome to Roman Noir. NOX DORMIENDA is the first of a new series in a new Roman Noir. Featuring Arcturus, a hardboiled protagonist in the best Philip Marlowe tradition, NOX is a different kind of historical mystery, a suspense thriller that combines a classic noir style with the rich texture of the ancient past.

The Curse-Maker is the sequel to he award-winning Nox Dormienda, the first book of the Roman noir series created by Kelli Stanley (City of Dragons). Wedding impeccably researched history to prose and themes reminiscent of classic hard-boiled writers, The Curse-Maker is a thrilling and suspenseful journey into a dark corner of Roman Britain you've never seen before. When Roman physician Arcturus and his stunning wife, Gwyna, arrive at Bath for a holiday, a dead body is floating in the sacred spring. It turns out that the murdered man is a curse-maker whose invocations actually come true, and as murder follows murder, it looks like there's now a curse on Arcturus. This is an exciting and exotic story of a spa town where people go to heal...only to wind up dead. And it takes the doctor-investigator on a dark road—into Roman cemeteries, silver mines, and underground water tunnels—to comprehend the twisted mind of a killer bent on revenge.