Book
Vita Brevis
First published 2016
Ruso and Tilla arrive in Rome with their infant daughter and take over a medical practice whose previous owner has disappeared. Their new home comes with aggressive creditors, unreliable tenants and a dead man concealed in a barrel, leaving Ruso responsible for a mystery that could destroy his professional standing.
While Tilla negotiates the expectations placed on a Roman wife and mother, Ruso searches for the vanished doctor and becomes entangled in the city’s competitive medical trade. The investigation exposes how reputation, patronage and debt shape life beneath Rome’s monumental public image.
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