The Green Bronze Mirror

Lynne Ellison

• 
• 
• 

Lovereading Price £4.99

RRP: £4.99

Download Extract Buy Now

Why I wrote this book

I wrote this book when I was 14, when I was a dreamy, bookish adolescent who could listen to the teacher with half an ear and write the book at the back of the class. My main reading at the time was novels set in Roman, Greek or medieval times. A weekend trip to Anglesey with my Mum gave the backdrop for the starting point, and travelling back in time was always a favourite fantasy. I believed my main character, Karen, was fictional, but with hindsight I realise she was me. Once started, the ideas flowed thick and fast and before the end of one chapter, the next would suggest itself. I did some additional research but even so slipped up on a couple of things that the editor later spotted, for instance the Romans had no tomatoes: they were brought to Europe from America centuries later.

I was thrilled when a publisher accepted it, and of course a huge fuss was made about such a young author. However, I spent the rest of my teen years trying to live it down. Boys didn't go for clever girls and if anyone mentioned it at a party I knew my chances were snookered. The book has been gathering dust in my memory for decades, so I was frankly astonished to be contacted by a private publisher last year, wanting to re-issue it.

However, when I look at it again, I'm surprised how good it is, and friends of mine are now begging for copies and reading it themselves.

Synopsis

Karen is playing on the beach when she finds an ancient mirror buried in the sand. She looks into it, and is transported back in time to the Roman empire. Finding herself a slave, she faces many hair-raising adventures in her struggle to return to her own time.

Reviews

A highly imaginative fifteen-year-old, Karen is taking a lonely walk on the beach during her family’s visit to the coast in England. She happens upon a mirror that transports her back nearly 2,000 years to Roman occupied Britain. Perhaps foolishly, she makes her presence known to a group of soldiers in an attempt to make sense of the situation, and as a result she ends up a slave.

Passed through many hands and making friends along the way, Karen eventually finds herself a house-slave belonging to an upper class family in Rome. There she witnesses many sights, events and personages she had read about back in her twentieth century life. While settling into her new position, not unhappy with her plight, she continually ponders ways of returning to her own family and time period.

Something the reader must keep in mind when critiquing this book is that it was written by a then fourteen-year-old. Considering this, the writing style is very mature and quite above standard. Why it was not edited or improved by the author in the later years I am not sure, but thinking back to my own adolescent writing I believe it would be a more nostalgic path to allow the writing to remain unedited and intact.

The Green Bronze Mirror is a fun and adventurous read for anyone interested in the history of Ancient Rome. The author’s knowledge and love of horses is very apparent in the writing, as are her religious beliefs, as Christianity is touched upon in a most fervent manner later in the book to coincide with the acts of the Emperor Nero and the burning of Rome. While there are many things in the book that could be questioned as to the plausibility – such as Karen’s abnormally accommodating and accepting disposition, the unlikely attitudes of others or situations that fall a little too neatly into place – the validity of the historical facts is accurate as far as my knowledge of the time period allows. Arleigh Johnson

See also review from The Bookworm's Library
Review from Mom Knows Everything
Review from Musings of a Book Addict
Review on Library of Clean Reads by Laura Fabiani (4 stars on Goodreads)
Review from Frugal Plus
Review from Charlotte's Library
Review from A few More Pages
Further reviews from Amazon
See also forthcoming reviews from Historical Novels Review, Books for Keeps, Iris magazine, and Carousel
Links to further reviews will be posted on the publisher's website http://www.cnposnerbooks.co.uk 

 

---

Are you...

• A published author
• An author yet to be published
• Someone who loves reading