Reviews tagging 'Torture'

A Fatal Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum: Murder in Ancient Rome by Emma Southon

20 reviews

inkwellimps's review against another edition

challenging dark funny reflective medium-paced

4.75

At first, I wasn't sure about this book. As someone more interested in Roman history than in true crime or popular culture, I hesitated in the introduction, as the author asserts that this book is Roman history for fans of true crime. I wasn't really fond of how Southon made a point to mention several times how "dull" aspects of Rome's history beyond the scope of the book were as a funny transition. This was probably exacerbated by the audiobook performance by Sophie Ward. Her haughty performance I found funny for the first hour and then for the next two I was thinking "how on Earth am I going to get through all of this?" After that though, I was able to get used to her delivery. 

The book really shines in the later half once it has your attention. Southon interprets "murder" broadly and gives details about gladiator fights that were completely new to me, amongst a plethora of other topics including murder within families and what society deemed as murder via magic. I would say the most important part of this book is how it  paints a detailed picture of slavery in Roman society. I had not realized quite how widespread the practice was. It was also interesting to me how Southon paints a realistic picture of Rome by assessing the biases that determine what history was written about and what history was not. I do recommend this book despite my rocky first impressions, and I intend to read more of Southon's works. I think for a general audience the writing style is approachable and the occasional modern analogy is welcome, I may have just had a problem with the audiobook's narrator.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Murder, Violence, and Torture

Moderate: Sexual violence, Classism, Animal cruelty, Rape, and Slavery

Minor: Suicide and Child death

emmsbookshelf's review

adventurous challenging dark funny informative sad medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Suicide attempt, Misogyny, Death, Murder, Gore, Blood, War, Violence, Torture, Suicide, Sexual assault, Rape, Physical abuse, Domestic abuse, Child death, Slavery, Sexual violence, and Colonisation

brep23's review

funny informative medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Death, and Torture

Moderate: Sexual violence, Suicide, and Gore

laurajeangrace's review against another edition

dark funny informative medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Torture, Slavery, Child death, Blood, Gore, Death, Domestic abuse, War, and Murder

Moderate: Religious bigotry

amrithi's review

dark funny informative medium-paced

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder and Torture

ravennemain's review

dark funny informative

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Torture, Slavery, and Murder

ehmannky's review

3.75

This was an interesting deep dive into how Ancient Romans conceptualized the act of murder, what was and what wasn't a murder, how the state should or could be involved, who counted as even being a person able to be murdered. I think that sometimes the flippant nature (never my favorite thing in true crime or history books) was a bit much, but I appreciated that the asides and jokes were at the expense of the men in power and that Southon spends a lot of time trying to humanize the people who died and were ignored by those in power in Ancient Rome. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Animal death, Death, Child death, and Torture

saltypiratewench's review

challenging dark funny informative lighthearted reflective medium-paced

4.0

I enjoyed her dry humor and taking the piss out of ancient ideas.  She made following the names of all these Romans easier than in other historical audiobooks I've tried.  The subject matter was very interesting and I learned a lot of new things.  I wish there could have been more about common people, but as she says in the book repeatedly, we don't know enough about them because they weren't important enough to the Romans to write anything about.  The stuff at the end about the executions and coliseum and crucifixions was ghastly and so interesting!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Torture and Murder

Moderate: Rape

yaboywillyshakes's review against another edition

challenging dark informative reflective medium-paced

2.25

While there are a handful of chapters where the author evokes the humanity of ancient murder victims and makes a decent argument about the way that murder is constructed as a concept by societies, her absolute disdain for the topic of Rome makes the first half of the book very hard to read. The later chapters are too full of somewhat childish pop culture references (largely Harry Potter, which also gives me pause for other reasons) to make the book relevant to larger audiences, and I was not impressed with the level of research in the last chapter specifically. It felt like the author was cherry picking information to support her own ends, and it felt very shallow in comparison with the preceding chapters.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abortion, Slavery, Suicide, Incest, Sexual violence, Rape, Murder, and Torture

It's about ancient Rome and murder, so perhaps the content warnings should be assumed, but the author sometimes shoehorns topics into places where I did not expect them, I wish I had been warned.

daphreads's review against another edition

4.0

A really interesting, and truly hilarious and entertaining, reflection of the way we view the Roman Empire vs what it really is. An investigation into the socially constructed concepts of life, dignity, and murder, and how the Romans viewed it as opposed to how we do now 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Blood, and Torture