The Background: I am not an expert on Roman culture, by any means, but I love my history and I can smell bullshit when I see it. I'm sorry, I can't make the book sound any more exciting than that, because it isn't. Lucia and Tag gradually fall in forbidden love, as another threatens their romance, and as the shadow of Mt. As a scholar, Lucia feels like something bad is going to happen, but nobody will listen to her, because she is young and female. Earthquakes, tremors, animals being jittery. Gods, the other gladiators were going to eat him alive.Meanwhile, strange things are happening in Pompeii. Tag noticed how carefully he protected his oiled curls as he pulled the tunic over his head. The patrician untied his filigreed, embroidered belt and began shrugging out of his tunic. And he's got to deal with an annoying new gladiator trainee, a pompous young patrician toff named Quintus. He wants a chance at his freedom, and aspires to be a gladiator. Tag was sent away a few years back, and now he's returned, a handsome young man who captures Lucia's attention, as a man, not as a childhood playmate. He has known nothing but slavery his whole life. He is her father's medical slave, a native Etruscan whose family have had their property taken away and given away in bondage as punishment. Lucia a Roman trophy wife.īut still, it's a better life than Tages (called Tag). To make it worse, hubby-to-be is old-fashioned, and a non-believer in educating females. Lucia's father has just given her away to a man old enough to be her grandfather. As a future husband, though, he left a great deal to be desired.Ick. So what's the big deal? Lucia was sure that the white-haired gentleman reclining on the dining couch before her would make a delightful grandfather. Fine, she's a girl when her father wanted a boy, and he hates her for that, but her father is fairly well-off, and as an upper-middle class woman, she's got a leisurely life. The Summary: Lucia's life doesn't seem that bad. A paranormal "curse" element that just felt completely out of place in a historical novel It has a character who is intrinsically naive and Too Stupid To Live towards the end while it's not her fault that she's so sheltered, it's also doesn't make for very good readingĤ. It is dull, there's a lot of historical details, and not much elseĢ. Painstaking details on the lives of the lesser gladiatorsġ. Instead, I got a lot of details on how the upper-class people and gladiator slaves lived their lives, and not much more than that for the greater parts of the book.Ģ. Vesuvius explosion, I wanted explosions, fires, earthquakes, deaths. I am a morbid mofo, so when I sought out a book set in Pompeii at the time of the Mt. There are some pretty heartbreaking images. Buried and burned alive under a river of lava. Many of them died right there, holding their loved ones. The city and its inhabitants were caught mostly unaware. It's the site of a vast volcanic eruption that happened in 79 A.D. I don't think I'm alone in being fascinated by Pompeii. “I am being sold and used, and I don’t like it.” “I am not a poor little rich girl,” she shot back, frustration turning into anger.
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