Literature / The Wolf Den Trilogy

The Wolf Den Trilogy is a Historical Fiction series by Elodie Harper. The first book in the series is The Wolf Den, followed by The House with the Golden Door (2022) and The Temple of Fortuna (2023). The series charts the course of Amara, a young woman from Attica, after she is enslaved and sent to Pompeii to work as a prostitute.

We first meet Amara as a she-wolf, a prostitute at the infamous lupanar in Pompeii. She used to be the beloved only child of a respected doctor, but now she is forced to sell her body for the benefit of her master Felix. Life in the brothel is brutal, yet she manages to survive with the help of fellow she-wolves. But Amara isn’t content to just survive. She is determined to regain her freedom, no matter the cost. Using her innate talent, cunning, and occasional cruelty, she sets about escaping the brothel. Along the way, Amara becomes entangled with characters ranging from humble slaves like Menander and Philos to illustrious aristocrats like Pliny the Elder and Berenice of Judea.

The latter two books follow Amara’s life as a freedwoman. Using the same wits that earned her freedom, she goes from a kept woman in Pompeii to an influential courtesan in the imperial palace of Rome. But despite her success, she remains tied to the Wolf Den, to the friends and enemies she made there. And little does she know that her city will soon be buried under a volcanic eruption...

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This series provides examples of:

• Accidental Murder: In the heat of the moment, Victoria stabs a man in the neck, killing him.
• Action Girl: Britannica is tough, courageous, and fiercely protective of her friends. She was a warrior in her homeland and carries her martial skills with her into the gladiatorial arena. As a gladiator, she fights as a retiarius (retiaria?), wielding a trident and net against her enemies.
• All Girls Want Bad Boys: Victoria is devoted to Felix, her violent and manipulative owner.
• Ancient Rome: Specifically, Pompeii in the years leading up to the infamous eruption of Vesuvius. The later books bring Amara to Rome and other places in Campania, like Stabiae.
• Anger Born of Worry: Amara snaps at her daughter Rufina and her enslaved playmate. She is not actually angry at them, but Amara is concerned for her daughter's safety and the scene is a reminder that Rufina is just one careless comment away from becoming a slave herself. She also argues with Philos because of their mutual concern for each other and the messes they keep getting into.
• Beauty Equals Goodness: Dido is regarded as the most beautiful of the main cast, and she is also a sensitive and loyal friend.
• Blackmail: Felix learns of Amara's secret love affair and uses the knowledge to extort money from her businesses.
• Body Paint: Dido and Amara buy a pot of gold paste for their performances and share it around. The Spanish dancers Ipstilla and Telethusa make their grand debut wearing nothing but this gold paste.
• Born into Slavery: A good number of the slaves and freedmen in the series were born as slaves. From the main cast, this includes Victoria (presumably, as she was found exposed on a garbage heap), Beronice, Felix, Demtrius, Philos, Fabia, and Paris.
• Brawn Hilda: Britannica is taller and more muscular than an average woman of the time. She carries herself with a masculine confidence and aggression which are turn-offs for most men. Her broken teeth definitely don't add to her appeal.
• Buxom Beauty Standard: Numerous characters mention Drauca’s amazing boobs. Drauca herself is well aware of this, as demonstrated in her introductory scene.
• Caged Bird Metaphor: Not a cage per se, but Drusilla compares Amara to a wounded bird cupped in Rufus’ hands. Pliny later argues for Amara’s freedom by explaining that birds need to be free to fly. This letter leads Rufus to refer to Amara as his “little bird” while keeping her in the house with the golden door.
  Drusilla: What [Rufus] wants is a little wounded bird he can hold, feel its wings flutter against his fingers…You might persuade him that there would be no greater pleasure than opening his fingers, watching the bird fly.
• Celibate Eccentric Genius: Pliny the Elder never married or had any children, and when he hires Amara as a concubine, he is more interested in asking her about birth control or having her read to him than having sex with her. His single-minded focus on his work causes others to perceive him as eccentric. Still, he is a very intelligent and insatiably curious man who is compiling his Natural History when he and Amara first meet.
• Child of Forbidden Love: Rufina is legally the daughter of Amara with her patron Rufus, but her biological father is Philos, her patron's enslaved steward.
• Conspicuous Consumption: Zoilus, a character partly inspired by inspired by Petronius’ Trimalchio, hosts a banquet with absurdly expensive Falernian wine and over-the-top dishes like a pie full of live (er, mostly live) birds. His house is suitably large and garish.
  • The wealthy of Rome live lavishly in massive houses and with a plethora of slaves attending to their every whim.
• The Coroner Doth Protest Too Much: Saturia dies in a tragic "accident" that definitely didn't involve her patron Domitian strangling her to death.
• Defiled Forever: Dido mourns the loss of her innocence and believes that her family would never take her back, even if she did somehow find them again.
• Den of Iniquity The Wolf Den, unsurprisingly.
• Disposable Sex Worker: Played with. In-universe, sex workers are absolutely seen as disposable. This is what makes Drauca’s casual murder so upsetting to the she-wolves. Demetrius offers to marry Amara because this would give her protection not afforded to sex workers. On the other hand, the narrative centres on sex workers, so it takes pains to treat them with empathy and give them personalities and goals.
• Doesn't Know Their Own Child: Rufus is only mildly interested in his daughter Rufina and hasn't bothered to remember her age. Hopefully he's more attentive to his teenage bride and their two children.
• Domestic Abuse: Unfortunately a very common (and accurate) occurrence in the book.
• Doppelgänger Replacement Love Interest: Salvius asks Amara to dress as his dead wife before sleeping with her.
• Driven to Suicide: Cressa drowns herself, unable to cope with another pregnancy and her own fading looks.
• Drowning My Sorrows: Cressa starts indulging in alcohol far more than the other women, a warning sign of her increasing despair.
• Entitled to Have You: Rufus wants Amara to be completely indebted to him. He has created her, made her a perfect concubine, so of course she owes him undying loyalty and affection.
• Everything's Better with Sparkles: Dido and Amara buy gauzy dresses shot through with silver to wear to swanky parties. One of the selling points is that the fabric shimmers when they move.
• Eye Scream: Drauca gets her eye cut out during a raid on Simo’s bar. Later in the story, Amara is threatened with the same as part of a revenge plot.
• Faking the Dead: Amara fakes being dead in order to assume a new identity and start a new life.
• Family Man: Philos is dedicated to his owner's family, including treating Rufus' little daughter Rufina like a surrogate father. He is Rufina's biological father, though he can't tell her that. He remains fondly attached to his deceased wife and mourns the fact that he couldn't have a family with her.
• Fiery Redhead: Britannica has bright red hair. She also makes no secret of how much she hates working in the Wolf Den, resisting the men who come to her with tooth and nail. She seems to have embraced her reputation as a Briton savage.
• Gladiator Games: The she-wolves attend a day of government-sponsored gladiator games. Amara only stays for the beast hunts. Later, when she has freedom and money, Amara sponsors a troop of gladiators led by Britannica.
• Grave-Marking Scene: Amara and Victoria go to Cressa’s grave marker and pour a Libation for the Dead.
• Green-Eyed Monster: The more experienced she-wolves, especially Victoria, resent Dido and Amara for landing cushy gigs at private house parties while they continue to toil in the dark and dirty lupanar. Victoria also becomes jealous of all the time Amara spends with Felix once he takes her on as an assistant.
• Guile Hero: Amara is always scheming to get ahead.
• Harp of Femininity: Drusilla, an elegant courtesan, plays the harp and instructs Amara in its use. Amara also plays the lyre.
• Hates Their Parent: Paris is an absolute Jerkass to his mother Fabia. Felix hated his father enough to arrange his murder.
• High-Class Call Girl: Amara is literate and musically talented thanks to her privileged upbringing. She eventually works her way up to the level of imperial courtesan, making her one of these. Drusilla, Saturia and others are also popular courtesans.
• Hollywood Thin: Once she takes up with Rufus, Amara has greater access to food but skips meals to keep herself as thin as she was at the brothel. Drusilla and several others express concern for her weight, but Amara insists that Rufus likes her skinny and frail.
• Hooker with a Heart of Gold: The women in the main cast are all sympathetic sex workers.
• I Just Want to Be Free: Amara’s greatest wish.
• The Ingenue: Dido is sensitive and innocent and takes the loss of her honour harder than her friends.
• Inter-Class Romance: Amara, a freedwoman of some means, falls in love with a slave belonging to her patron.
• I Want to Be a Real Man: Paris is insecure in his masculinity due to being a Pretty Boy sent down to entertain clients with the women. He jumps at the chance to prove his toughness toward the end of the first book.
• I Will Only Slow You Down: Pliny is left behind after he collapses and is unable to escape the ash and pumice from Vesuvius. Amara also argues to be left behind when she feels she is too weak to continue, but she manages to push through.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Everybody at the brothel thinks Gallus is manipulating Beronice’s affection for free sex. He can be abrasive, but he does seem to sincerely care for Beronice.
• Lie Back and Think of England: Amara copes with the overwhelming panic of sexual contact by disassociating herself, for example trying to count the folds of a curtain over the man’s shoulder.
• Life-Saving Encouragement: When Amara is fleeing Vesuvius with her companions, she struggles to cope with the exhaustion and despair. The invincible courage of Britannica and some encouraging words from Philos keep her moving through the ash and stones.
• The Load: Fabia is seen as less valuable than the young women because she can’t make money through prostitution anymore. The active she-wolves sacrifice portions of their own tips to support her.
  • Britannica is seen as even more useless than Fabia because her screaming and fighting makes the customers leave or turn violent.
• Loan Shark: Felix isn’t just a pimp but a loan shark. Amara also starts a lending business, though she insists her rates are far lower than Felix's.
• Loose Lips: Saturia lets slip Domitian's ambitions for the throne, resulting in her death.
• Love Martyr: Victoria is utterly devoted to Felix, even though she recognises that he is a vile person. Felix on his part exploits Victoria’s feelings for all they’re worth.
• Made a Slave: Amara, Dido, and Menander were all born free and enslaved later in life.
• Mama's Baby, Papa's Maybe: Felix’s father is supposedly the brothel’s previous owner, but given that he is literally a Son of a Whore, there’s no way of knowing. Later, Amara bears a child whose legal father is not the biological father.
• Manipulative Bastard: Felix knows exactly what to do or say to keep his slaves in check, or to squeeze his clients for all their money. Amara becomes increasingly manipulative and ruthless as the series goes on.
• Marriage of Convenience: Amara gets engaged to her much-older patron Demetrius not because they are in love, but because he wants to provide his favourite spy some level of protection from the scheming in the imperial palace.
• Meaningful Gift: Pliny gives Amara a copy of Herophilos’ On Pulses at the end of her stay. She used to read Herophilos to her father before his death. At the very end of the first book, Amara sends Felix a statuette of Diana, referencing a scene from early in the book. Amara gets other meaningful gifts from her patrons, including a cameo of herself in the guise of Pallas Athene, which both ties her to her homeland of Attica and references her cunning.
• Meaningful Rename: Timarete is given the slave-name Amara. When she is freed, she becomes Gaia Plinia Amara, Liberta. In the last book, she reverts to Timarete and settles down with a renamed Philos/Fidelius and Rufina/Fidelia.
• Men Get Old, Women Get Replaced: Fabia has lost all her value in Roman eyes, a prostitute grown too old to be desirable. Getting old is a recurring issue for courtesans and sex workers, and their hierarchy is based to an extent on their perceived ages. For example, Amara looks down on the washed-up Myrtele for being in her thirties. That's right, thirties is old for a courtesan. Men on the other hand are allowed to get to their sixties and seventies before they are considered "old."
• The Mistress: Amara becomes this to Rufus, though he is unmarried when they meet. Drusilla and other courtesans also serve as mistresses to their respective patrons.
• Mob War: Felix and Simo run rival criminal enterprises. Over the course of the first book, things escalate in a Cycle of Revenge until one side commits arson and murder. And then the other side attempts a revenge murder.
• Morning Sickness: The first sign of Cressa’s pregnancy is that she starts making frequent trips to the lavatory to vomit.
• Ms. Fanservice: The she-wolves need to appeal to their clients. This ranges from working nude in the Wolf Den to wearing translucent robes during dinner parties.
• Nice Guy: Menander is genuinely kind to Amara, and the only man she’s ever truly loved. Even after she breaks up with him to spare both their feelings, he wants to be her friend and comforts her when she’s at her lowest.
  • Cressa is also notably nice to others, going out of her way to help her friends in need and taking the wild Britannica under her wing. Nicandrus, Zoskales, and Fulvius have less focus but also treat Amara and the she-wolves with kindness.
• No Guy Wants an Amazon: Britannica is unusually tall and muscular for a woman in Pompeii, in line with Roman reports of “giant” Northern Europeans and British warrior women like Boudica. When the girls take her out fishing for clients, she deters potential customers not just with her physique, but by baring her teeth and hissing at them.
• Nouveau Riche: Zoilus is a freedman who wants to impress his buddies with his wealth. The pedigreed Quintus and Marcus find his extravagant displays hilarious.
• The Oldest Profession: The main cast are sex workers.
• Obi-Wan Moment: Pliny the Elder, Amara's friend and mentor collapses on the shore and tells the other refugees from Vesuvius to go on without him. When Amara insists on trying to save him, or at least staying with him while he dies, he calmly gestures (being unable to speak) for her to leave him and lies back to wait for death.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: The profound impact of Cressa’s death is made apparent by the other characters’ uncharacteristic reactions. In more detail, Beronice loses control and starts screaming and hitting the wall, while hot-tempered Britannica becomes quiet and subdued. Victoria walks in with a customer and immediately switches from flirty to furious. Even hard-hearted Felix slips up and shows some vulnerability to Amara.
• Painful Rhyme: Cornelius writes a hymn to Flora that rhymes fucking with shucking, among other tortuous rhymes.
• Parental Abandonment: Amara mourns for her deceased father and has nothing but fond memories of him. She even misses her mother, who sold her into slavery (granted, Amara was sold to ensure her survival) and has probably starved to death since. Later, Amara herself becomes an absentee parent, living most of the year with her patron in Rome while her daughter Rufina is raised in Pompeii.
  • Cressa had a son named Cosmus who was sold as a toddler.
• Parting-Words Regret: Dido remembers complaining to her cousin about her less-than-ideal engagement just before they were kidnapped and enslaved by pirates. She never even got to say goodbye to her family, but instead spent her last moments in Carthage feeling sorry for herself. If only she knew how bad it would get.
• Platonic Prostitution: Pliny is more interested in asking Amara about birth control or having her read to him while he takes notes than he is in having sex with her. Menander also buys time with Amara just so they can chat.
• Popularity Cycle: Amara and Dido are hired to perform at dinner parties as a novelty. By the end of the book, their fifteen minutes of fame is ending and their patrons have moved on to the new and sexy Spanish dancers.
• Pre-Mortem One-Liner: When Amara kills Felix, she utters one while her enemy lies bleeding out on the floor, reminding him that all his striving was for naught. The line is a quote from Britannica, who had long wanted to kill Felix herself but was presumed dead at the time.
  Amara: And when you are dead, you are nothing.
• Public Bathhouse Scene: The book opens in the baths, and different bath houses feature throughout the books.
• Rags to Riches: Amara starts the series as the lowest kind of slave and works her way up to a freedwoman of independent means in the imperial court.
• Removing the Rival: Amara was sold to a man named Chremes as a house slave/concubine, but his wife Niobe became jealous and arranged to sell Amara on.
• The Resenter: Amara keeps on rising in status due to a mix of wit, charm, pragmatism, and luck. This earns her the resentment of her former friends and associates, who continue to live in squalor or, if they do improve their circumstances, achieve much less success than she does. This jealousy and resentment may have factored into Victoria's betrayal.
• Rich Bastard: Quintus and his buddy Marcus are the scions of wealthy and respectable families and also thoroughly unpleasant individuals. They initially hire Dido and Amara as a dig at their Nouveau Riche host’s humble origins and spend the rest of the night making snide comments.
• Rich Suitor, Poor Suitor: Amara’s first love is Menander, a potter’s slave, but she has also attracted the wealthy Rufus, whose affection could offer her a way out of the brothel. Later, she has to make an even harder decision when she chooses between the political bigwig Demetrius and her true love, a gentle slave.
• Safety in Indifference: Amara tries to hold herself apart from any of her lovers and convince herself that they are just means to an end. It isn’t always successful, and she can end up forming other attachments and loyalties instead.
• Sarcasm-Blind: Beronice doesn’t understand sarcasm and jokes. Amara suspects she may play dumb to make the other women laugh.
• Scarpia Ultimatum: In the final chapters of the series, Amara is pressured to sleep with her blackmailer and sell her body on his behalf, lest the blackmailer reveal to her patron Demetrius that she faked her own death to start a new life with a slave who is living illegally as a freedman. Should her secrets be exposed, Amara's loved ones (and possibly Amara herself) would be condemned to death.
• Sex Slave: The Wolf Den is staffed by enslaved sex workers. Even common household slaves can expect to be raped by their owners. As Philos says: “When you’re young, they fuck you, and when you’re old, they fuck you over.” Sadly, this is truth in literature.
• Shown Their Work: The chapters begin with Pompeiian graffiti and quotes from Roman authors. The writing also references art and architecture found in the archaeological site of Pompeii.
• Single Woman Seeks Good Man: Amara is definitely physically attracted to Philos but a lot of her love is based on the fact that he is and always was nice to her, even when she was a lowly brothel slave.
• Slave Brand: Fortunata covers hers with heavy makeup. Philos has a brand on his chest.
• Slave Market: Where Dido and Amara met.
• The Social Expert: Amara is acutely aware of social dynamics and other people’s desires. She uses her expertise to climb the social ladder. Felix is also good at reading people, but where Amara uses a gentle touch to achieve her goals, he uses a sledgehammer.
• Son of a Whore: Paris is the son of Fabia, who used to be a prostitute before becoming too old to be desirable. Felix also qualifies.
• Starting a New Life: The destruction of Pompeii gives the survivors a chance start their lives anew. The book ends with Amara faking her own death so she can settle down with Philos (who pretends to be a freedman) and their daughter. Her first love, Menander/Kallias lives nearby as a fake freedman as well.
• STD Immunity: Considering the book’s focus on Roman prostitution, including ancient contraception, it seems odd that none of the she-wolves suffer from an STI.
• Stepford Smiler: The she-wolves must put on a fun and flirtatious act when working with clients. It doesn’t matter how repulsive or threatening the man is, they can never let him see how scared or disgusted they really are. If Amara is any indication, they are also constantly seething with pent-up rage. Fortunately, they are able to drop the mask and vent to each other in private.
• Streetwalker: The she-wolves go “fishing” for customers in crowded public areas.
• Symbolically Broken Object: Amara drops Menander's Saturnalia gift at the exact moment she breaks his heart.
• Team Mom: Cressa is the oldest of the (active) she-wolves and shows great care for her friends. Notably, she is the only person in the Wolf Den who bothers to befriend Britannica. However, her kindness is established early on in the story when Amara is about to be overwhelmed by too many clients and Cressa draws them away.
• Teach Me How To Fight: Amara asks Britannica, who used to be a warrior in her homeland, for self-defense training.
• Thinks Like a Romance Novel: Rufus loves comedy theatre and projects comedy tropes onto real life. He wants to cast himself as a noble hero, rescuing a lovely and wrongfully-enslaved woman from her miserable circumstances.
• Too Good for This Sinful Earth: Dido, the youngest, most delicate, and most innocent of the she-wolves is inadvertently killed at the end of the first book. As if to further hammer home her innocence, her death had nothing to do with her own wrongdoings or decisions. She was merely collateral damage in another person's conflict, as her killer was actually aiming for Felix, her pimp and master.
• Tragic Keepsake: Amara keep her father’s old medicine bag. Marcella keeps her mother’s cameo ring.
• The Villain Knows Where You Live: One of Felix's favourite intimidation tactics is to spy on his targets and later reveal that he knows where they live, who their family and friends are, and other potential weak spots.
• We Used to Be Friends: Amara and Victoria were close friends. They supported each other, risked their lives for each other, rescued each other from slavery... then the latter betrays Amara and tells Felix that Amara is having an affair with her patron's slave. The two never reconcile, even after three years.
• What Does She See in Him?: The other she-wolves don’t understand why Beronice loves Gallus and suspect he’s just using her for free sex. Victoria’s loyalty to Felix provokes similar reactions.
• While Rome Burns: Pliny's warships, which he meant to use in a rescue mission, have been beached. He and his friends are stuck in a villa with a volcano threatening to bury them alive. Through it all, Pliny is determined to keep things as normal as possible: bathing, dining, napping. Amara assumes it's just part of his usual eccentricity, but then she sees his expression slip and knows he's actually terrified and trying to keep everyone else calm.
• Would Hit a Girl: Felix, Rufus, Domitian all physically assault women in their lives, or even worse.
• You're Just Jealous: Beronice’s typical response when the others (usually Victoria) criticize or tease her about her relationship with Gallus.