The Ancient Ocean Blues
Grade 7–9—In this story set in ancient Rome, Marcus is asked to stop a young, idealistic soldier named Spurinna from reaching Pompey, who is at sea fighting pirates. Cicero has proposed that Spurinna and Pompey join forces and halt Caesar's rise to power. Marcus reluctantly goes, and finds himself stuck on a ship with Paulla, whom he dislikes even though his parents expect him to marry her, and she is interested in Spurinna. After a violent storm, their vessel is shipwrecked and the two, along with Spurinna's old secretary, Homer, are soon forced into slavery by an evil Spartan farmer. Once they manage to escape, they must contend with pirates, and later Greek men thirsty for vengeance. The writing in the opening part of the story is choppy, with little to no historical background, but once Marcus is at sea, the action steadies and flows smoothly. The characters are wonderfully drawn: Homer and Paulla are particularly engaging, and teenaged Marcus is a lovable, if bumbling, hero. While this appears to be a companion to Mitchell'sThe Roman Conspiracy(Tundra, 2005), readers need not have read that book to understand this one. If kids can wade through the first 30 pages, they will find themselves on a rollickingly good adventure.—Necia Blundy, Marlborough Public Library, MACopyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.