Review: An interesting premise, and an enjoyable light read
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 12 29, 2012
This is an engaging piece of battle-fiction.I found the beginning especially strong; we're dropped into the story, in medias res, as Alexandria burns.  Such exposition as is needed -- which truly isn't much -- is worked neatly and fairly subtly in, without slowing down the headlong pace.I thoroughly enjoyed the heroine -- she's not deeply nuanced, as other reviews have noted, but she's lively and exciting, and I'd be quite happy to follow her future adventures, if more books in this series appear.  I'd definitely like to learn more about her history, and the martial tradition of her family; I hope we'll get more of that in future books!  Supporting characters are not complex, but most are drawn with at least a few keen details that give them specificity.The world-building is not extravagant, but is perfectly sufficient to give the reader a sense of the place and time.  The story is less epic that I think I expected from the book description -- everything happens on a smaller and more human level than I think the description suggests.  I actually liked that about the book, but I think the book description is imperfect in that way.The technology is one of the truly fascinating aspects of the book.  The ideas are compelling, and are presented within an historical context that gives them plausibility.  It might not be practical on an e-book, in an indie-publishing situation, but I found myself longing for a few diagrams or images of some of the pieces of tech; the book doesn't suffer without them, but would simply be a richer experience with them.The battle scenes seemed to me to be just a little tedious, at times -- perhaps including just a tiny bit more detail, moment-to-moment, than was warranted. Not by any means unreadable, but I found myself starting to skim at times.I had a few minor issues with nomenclature, some of which have been addressed by other reviewers.  Pylum is a singular noun, but is used repeatedly in the novel as plural.  Not a terrible error, but just something I found a little jarring, every time I encountered it.  Also, there's a lot of usage of Roman military terms, and while I personally was familiar with most of them (3 years of Latin and 2 semesters of Ancient Roman History -- finally of some use!), I think they might be a tad confusing to many readers.  Just a few sentences early on, in just a few places, providing just a little guidance about such things as the organization of the Roman military -- the century, the cohort, the legion, etc -- might be tremendously helpful.I read a number of indie-published works.  The inevitable proofreading errors in such works are present here, but not in great numbers.  The prose itself is varied -- at times, it's unremarkable but nevertheless clean and effective, but at times it gets noticeably better than that.Overall, this is a fun, lively read, and certainly worth the current price (at the time of this review, it's $3.99).  I'd recommend it, and will be buying more from this author.