Sign up for our newsletters to receive our Most Anticipated Books of 2025!

Lindsey Davis Biography, Books, and Similar Authors

Author Biography  | Interview  | Books by this Author  | Read-Alikes

Lindsey Davis

Lindsey Davis

Lindsey Davis Biography

Lindsey Davis was born and raised in Birmingham, read English at Oxford, then joined the civil service. After thirteen years, her first novel (which she'd written for herself) was runner-up for the Georgette Heyer Historical Novel Prize, which encouraged her to leave her job and try to become a writer.

She had romantic serials commissioned for Woman's Realm, then changed to writing about the Romans with The Course of Honour, the remarkable true love story of the Emperor Vespasian and his mistress Antonia Caenis. Her research into imperial Rome then inspired The Silver Pigs, the first in the Falco series about a Roman informer in the AD70s, which has now attracted a devoted readership.

The Silver Pigs won the Authors' Club Best First Novel for 1989, and Davis was awarded the CWA Dagger in the Library in 1995. In 2011 she was awarded the Crimewriters' Association Cartier Diamond Dagger for lifetime achievement.

From the author's website

Lindsey Davis's website

This bio was last updated on 10/21/2016. In a perfect world, we would like to keep all of BookBrowse's biographies up to date, but with many thousands of lives to keep track of it's simply impossible to do. So, if the date of this bio is not recent, you may wish to do an internet search for a more current source, such as the author's website or social media presence. If you are the author or publisher and would like us to update this biography, send the complete text and we will replace the old with the new.

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $50 for 12 months or $18 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Interview

In two separate essays, written by Lindsey Davis, she discusses how she came to write the Falco series and how the locations, plots and even the character of Falco himself ('Sam Spade in a ratty toga'), have developed during this long-running series.

I have been writing now for over fifteen years, though it has passed in a flash. I always wanted to write historical novels, which were what I primarily read as a girl, but I never intended to cover the Romans. My interest was the political history of England in the Seventeeth Century and I did begin my published career with romantic serials about the Civil War for 'Woman's Realm'.

The Romans came later - first the love story of the Emperor Vespasian as seen through the eyes of his mistress Antonia Caenis in 'The Course of Honour' and then my Roman detective, Marcus Didius Falco. Falco began as something of a joke: would it be possible to place a forties-style private eye two thousand years ago? Rome at that time seemed an ideal alternative to the big metropolitan settings of so may 'gumshoe' novels - a huge, dangerous, colourful city that saw itself as the centre of the world. It was full of characters on the make - and really did have men called 'informers', who hid behind pillars listening for information they could sell, or who actually took people to court in order to receive compensation like modern 'ambulance chasers'.

So Falco was born, a wise-cracking cynic, ...

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $50 for 12 months or $18 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Books by this Author

Books by Lindsey Davis at BookBrowse
Desperate Undertaking jacket Master and God jacket Nemesis jacket Alexandria jacket
Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $50 for 12 months or $18 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Read-Alikes

All the books below are recommended as read-alikes for Lindsey Davis but some maybe more relevant to you than others depending on which books by the author you have read and enjoyed. So look for the suggested read-alikes by title linked on the right.
How we choose read-alikes

  • Ruth Downie

    Ruth Downie

    In 2004, Ruth Downie won the Fay Weldon section of BBC3's End of Story competition. Her first novel, Medicus and the Disappearing Dancing Girls was published in the UK in 2006, and in the USA in 2007 (as simply Medicus). The ... (more)

    If you enjoyed:
    The Accusers

    Try:
    Medicus
    by Ruth Downie

  • Diana Gabaldon

    Diana Gabaldon

    Diana Gabaldon is the author of the award-winning, #1 New York Times bestselling Outlander novels.

    The series is published in 26 countries and 23 languages, and includes a nonfiction companion volume, The Outlandish ... (more)

    If you enjoyed:
    The Accusers

    Try:
    Lord John and The Private Matter
    by Diana Gabaldon

We recommend 8 similar authors

View all 8 Read-Alikes

Non-members can see 2 results. Become a member
Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $50 for 12 months or $18 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Top Picks

  • Book Jacket: The Capital of Dreams
    The Capital of Dreams
    by Heather O'Neill
    "Sometimes war can set a woman free," declares Sofia Bottom's larger-than-life intelligentsia mother...
  • Book Jacket: The Lion Women of Tehran
    The Lion Women of Tehran
    by Marjan Kamali
    Seven-year-old Ellie, living in Tehran in the 1950s, has just lost her father. She and her single ...
  • Book Jacket: Clear
    Clear
    by Carys Davies
    John Ferguson is a principled man. But when, in 1843, those principles drive him to break from the ...
  • Book Jacket: The Mighty Red
    The Mighty Red
    by Louise Erdrich
    Permit me to break the fourth wall. Like any good reviewer, I aim to analyze a book dispassionately,...

BookBrowse Book Club

Book Jacket
The Memory Library
by Kate Storey
Journey through the pages of this heartwarming novel, where hope, friendship and second chances are written in the margins.
Book Jacket
Babylonia
by Costanza Casati
From the author of the bestselling Clytemnestra comes another intoxicating excursion into ancient history. When kings fall, queens rise.

Members Recommend

  • Book Jacket

    The Secret History of the Rape Kit
    by Pagan Kennedy

    The story of the woman who kicked off a feminist revolution in forensics, and then vanished into obscurity.

  • Book Jacket

    Going Home
    by Tom Lamont

    Going Home is a sparkling, funny, bighearted story of family and what happens when three men take charge of a toddler following an unexpected loss.

Book Club Giveaway!
Win My Darling Boy

My Darling Boy by John Dufresne

The story of of a man whose son collapses into addiction and vanishes into the chaotic netherworld of southern Florida.

Enter

Wordplay

Solve this clue:

Y C L a H T W but Y C M H D

and be entered to win..

Your guide toexceptional          books

BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.