In Return to Lesbos, during the Peloponnesian War in Classical Greece, just after Athens (the city-state) quells the revolt of Lesbos in 427 BC, Athens’ initial impulse is to put to death every male in Mytilene, on Lesbos, and to sell all the women and children into slavery. At this very time, Arion must return to Mytilene to retrieve the family estate from his treacherous uncle, find his mate and free her, and then return to Athens to make an enormous payment against the (illicit) enslavement-collateral contract held by his longtime nemesis, the banker/pirate Smerdis, or face a return to the mines in Laurion. He has eight days.
To assist potential readers in making good choices about whether or not to purchase any of the four volumes of Arion’s Odyssey, I offer the following additional information about this tetralogy, which is set in Classical Greece, with the city-state (polis) of Athens as one protagonist and Arion (a human) as the other.
Each volume of Arion’s Odyssey is a combination of historical novel, ancient travelogue, ancient poetry, mythology, religion, and history. If you would enjoy a saga as detailed as Melville’s Moby-Dick, as kaleidoscopic as Michener’s Iberia, and as expansive as Hugo’s Les Misérables, you might love this tetralogy.
Regarding Athens and its empire, the following portion of each novel is similar to an ancient travelogue: one third of Life After Death at Ipsambul (volume 1); one fifth of Aegean Fire (volume 2); one tenth of Beyond the Battle of Naupaktos (volume 3); one tenth of Return to Lesbos (volume 4).
Set in the ancient Mediterranean world, Arion’s Odyssey is an adult story about Arion, a sensitive Greek (boy becoming a man) from a wealthy mercantile family on the Greek island of Lesbos. It begins fourteen years prior to the inception of the Peloponnesian War, and ends during that war: it spans the period from 445 BC to 427 BC.
If you would like to experience life in the ancient Mediterranean world, then you will probably enjoy this adult story about coming-of-age there.
Assessment:
Plot: Return to Lesbos is the final book of a tetralogy, and it presumably picks up where the previous installment left off. New readers will find themselves scrambling to keep track of the characters, their histories, and their motivations. Nonetheless, the book is well plotted with some fun moments of action that punctuate the novel.
Prose: Though the descriptions tend to be a tad verbose, the prose strikes a fine balance between denseness and clarity. The dialogue is snappy, and the author has made efforts to keep it historically consistent.
Originality: The plot and characters are original and interesting, though they fit too easily into archetypal roles. The authentic use of historical figures and landmarks serves the story well, portraying a vibrant civilization full of enlightenment and treachery. Indeed, the author displays a fastidious attention to historical detail, though it sometimes slows the story's momentum.
Character Development: While there are certainly many characters of varying importance (and a lengthy glossary to help lost readers regain their bearings), there is little in the way of meaningful development for the key characters. Perhaps more of the ground work was done in the previous installments, but the primary characters, Arion and Smerdis, each have a singular focus and are lacking in depth.
Date Submitted: March 03, 2017
A young man with a mission must travel to the island of Lesbos in volume four of a historical fiction series set in ancient Greece.
It is August 427 B.C. and a man named Arion finds himself in a precarious situation. Arion owes money to an unpleasant individual known as Smerdis and he has only eight days to repay his debt. The stakes are high for Arion, as failure on his part will end in his own enslavement. His only hope lies in sailing to the city of Mytilene (on Lesbos), where he will attempt to save his family estate from his treacherous Uncle Erxandros. Meanwhile, the Peloponnesian War is under way and the Athenian empire has just finished suppressing a revolt in, as it just so happens, Mytilene. Initially, the Athenians would like to put to death every man in Mytilene and sell all of the women and children into slavery. Athenian hearts soften, however, and the harsh orders are revoked. The only problem is that a ship has already been sent to carry out the orders. The Athenians must now send a faster vessel if the people of Mytilene are to be spared. Luckily for Arion, he is not only headed in that direction, but he is also a powerful oarsman. After obtaining a rowing position on the ship carrying the rescindment order, he has quite the set of tasks ahead of him. Fortunately, Arion’s duties are ones that manage to make excellent use of the time period that the story portrays. The threat of enslavement and massacres were, after all, not alien concepts to the ancient Greeks, and Arion’s challenging situation is based on historical events. But Sten’s (Life After Death at Ipsambul, 2015, etc.) dramatization of the hero’s predicaments often leans toward the obvious, such as when the reader is told: “To Arion this ship is a symbolic connection between this shore and that, as ships always have been, whether for commerce or war.” The reader is likely to already know the many uses for ships, and while Arion does eventually proceed on his way, such sentiments only manage to slow this otherwise well-paced action tale.
Alive with the difficulties of an ancient era, this Greek sailing adventure remains hampered by portions of overexplanation.
