Write Out Loud (Reviews and Writing)

“Nothing has waned in these stories…I finished this one and immediately reached for the next.”

Here we are now at the ninth of seventeen books in this series of adventure tales set in the Roman world of AD 80. After the emotionally harrowing trauma of the last few books (especially the last one), Lawrence takes us back to the kind of adventures the four main child protagonists had at the beginning of the series.

There’s more than one kind of return here. We’re back to dealing with child kidnappers as the four detectives set off on the ship that used to be a slave ship that brought one of them, Nubia, to Ostia in the first place and now belongs to another, Lupus, who had his tongue cut out by the deceased owner of the slave ship. It also sees the father of Flavia, the leader of the gang of four, back to sailing ships as is his profession. They all set off to stop another slave ship and bring down a slave-trading industry.

As always, Lawrence tantalises us with a mixture of fact and fiction. The veracity of her little details, such as the places they visit and the running of the ship, I’ve stopped checking. They’re always spot on. But she also throws in real people and you never know which character or characters will turn out to be rooted in history. It is strange to say that, despite reading many books on Roman history (to the extent that I found Mary Beard’s book thoroughly disappointing) I have learned more about the period through reading these books than anything else.

This story is a cracking yarn but, as with all the others, it sets up for more stories to come. There is unfinished business for Lupus in this story and not everything will be resolved. Then there’s the bad guys of the story. I will say no more about them and the size of their importance <privately sniggers to himself>…

Nothing has waned in these stories, nine books in as we are. I finished this one and immediately reached for the next. While I still have odd questions about the importance of religion and the supernatural (Lawrence continuing to brilliantly keep these running in the background without preaching or descending into Indiana Jones-esque finales) and I suspect the issue of love and marriage is going to become more real for at least one of these characters before long (despite none of them being older than ten currently), overall I’m just so impressed by the high standard Lawrence has maintained. It has been fifteen years or so since the last of these books was published. I do hope they are still much read and loved; they really are so, so good. On to book X!

My Verdict:

You can buy me a coffee if you like! More accurately, you can help support my work either as a one off or monthly if you really want to show your love…

Read all the reviews for this series:

• Reflection: The Roman Mysteries by Caroline Lawrence
• The Roman Mysteries I – The Thieves of Ostia by Caroline Lawrence
• The Roman Mysteries II – The Secrets of Vesuvius by Caroline Lawrence
• The Roman Mysteries III – The Pirates of Pompeii
• The Roman Mysteries IV – The Assassins of Rome by Caroline Lawrence
• The Roman Mysteries V – The Dolphins of Laurentum by Caroline Lawrence
• The Roman Mysteries VI – The Twelve Tasks of Flavia Gemina by Caroline Lawrence
• The Roman Mysteries VII – The Enemies of Jupiter by Caroline Lawrence
• The Roman Mysteries VIII – The Gladiators from Capua by Caroline Lawrence
• The Roman Mysteries IX – The Colossus of Rhodes by Caroline Lawrence
• The Roman Mysteries X – The Fugitive from Corinth by Caroline Lawrence
• The Roman Mysteries XI – The Sirens of Surrentum by Caroline Lawrence
• The Roman Mysteries XII – The Charioteer of Delphi by Caroline Lawrence
• The Roman Mysteries XIII – The Slave-girl from Jerusalem by Caroline Lawrence

Social Entrepreneur, educationalist, bestselling author and journalist, D K Powell is the author of the bestselling collection of literary short stories “The Old Man on the Beach“. His first book, ‘Sonali’ is a photo-memoir journal of life in Bangladesh and has been highly praised by the Bangladeshi diaspora worldwide. Students learning the Bengali language have also valued the English/Bengali translations on every page. His third book is ‘Try not to Laugh’ and is a guide to memorising, revising and passing exams for students.

Both ‘The Old Man on the Beach’ and ‘Sonali’ are available on Amazon for kindle and paperback. Published by Shopno Sriti Media. The novel,’The Pukur’, was published by Histria Books in 2022.

D K Powell is available to speak at events (see his TEDx talk here) and can be contacted at dkpowell.contact@gmail.com. Alternatively, he is available for one-to-one mentoring and runs a course on the psychology of writing. Listen to his life story in interview with the BBC here.

Ken writes for a number of publications around the world. Past reviewer for Paste magazine, The Doughnut, E2D and United Airways and Lancashire Life magazine. Currently reviews for Northern Arts Review. His reviews have been read more than 7.9 million times.

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