Blood Moon

'Blood Moon' by Heather Robinson is fast-paced, vivid, and extraordinarily well-researched. You really do feel immersed in the Rome and Britain of the 1st century AD reading this book, and the care the author has took to make that happen radiates off the page in only the best ways possible. Maia, Clete, and Emerick are compelling and complex characters with their own idiosyncrasies, faults, and secrets. They don't always make the best decisions, but they aren't perfect people - their flaws only make them more endearing. I did appreciate Maia's gradual development as she learned more about healing and the use of herbs - it isn't every day that you get a female protagonist who has to work hard to become skillful instead of being naturally/instinctively gifted at everything she does. The setting as the action shifts from Roma to Gaul to Britannia is rendered completely for the reader to envision and the prose is excellent; easy to read without ever getting to be too purple.

The only piece of meaningful criticism I can give is that this book needed some more editing - there is a couple of chapters where an injury of Clete's jumps from his leg to his arm and then back to his leg again. I thought I must have been mistaken until I went back and checked; sure enough, the injured area is inconsistent. A structural edit would have caught this error. And the prose being so good does highlight the handful of clunky sentences with redundant words and phrasing - a few more editing passes would have corrected these.

Robinson is clearly a talented writer with a knack for compelling characters and realistically realized ancient worlds. This is the first novel of hers that I've read and it certainly won't be the last. I recommend you pick it up if you're a lover of ancient Roman historical fiction!