Amanda Cockrell

Enjoyable. Further adventures of Faustus Silvius Valerianus. In this outing he is sent to Hibernia to train a native army to put the true High king on the throne. When that is concluded successfully, he returns to Roman Britain, he is then sent to the far north as Prefect of Batavians in one of the outlying northern forts. He has to contend with a most unhappy widowed sister, Silvia, who has come with her son to live with him. The boy is thrilled with his new life. Cleaning up after a mudslide, which destroys property and people is a challenge for him. He fights a band of rebels from the Orcades [today's Orkneys] and Hibernians and must reckon with his personal life, including a tribeswoman from the Orcades. The story was enthralling, and I do think the author's style is delightful.… (more)

Faustus, heir to the family farm, when his father dies, sells it and joins the army and becomes part of Agricola's Caledonian campaign. We get all points of view about the Roman invasion, even from tribesmen of the north. An enjoyable read, with likeable characters. There is a bit of magic realism in the person of Faustus's father's shade who appears to Faustus sometimes and also in the persons of the "Old Ones", the "Little dark people", a type of hobgoblin, who were allegedly of the people who lived in Britain before the current inhabitants. They were mentioned in the author's earlier Roman duology about the Ninth Legion Hispana, but never appeared.… (more)