How To Survive The Roman Empire, By Pliny And Me

Pliny and his mother go shopping for a new slave. Pliny wants someone with secretarial skills to help him get his letters ready for publication. His mother has other needs in mind.

Pliny and his mother go shopping for a new slave. Pliny wants someone with secretarial skills to help him get his letters ready for publication. His mother has other needs in mind. They choose a man who was captured by the Romans when they invaded Wales and who has learned Latin and Greek from his previous master.

Back at the villa the nervous new member of the household meets Doris, the Greek cook, an unsuccessful prophetess who was pipped to the post of Oracle at Delphi by another girl.

If Pliny and his household are to survive the snake-pit of Imperial Rome, they must negotiate a political minefield, keep their eyes peeled for spies and most of all, not do anything to annoy the Emperor.