Marcus has made it to Book 4 and we are promised by the end many more. Now however he is out of Britain, and this becomes puzzling in that the adversary here that the man we know is the hero of the story, is the Centurion, out of all his choice of officers to look into, that needs to be investigated to the point that he learns Marcus' secret.

Riches falls into this trap that he believes his tale of the comic book like Marcus needs to be full of this dark past that must haunt his character in every tale. Not so. It is old now and wearing thin. Only appearing here to be filler when it was completely not needed to the tale. The plot twists and devices that the book already has was more than enough to make a strong read. Here, on the edges of the Empire, there is more than enough intrigue to provide a fertile field of action and adventure with out the added nonsense that the protagonist has lugging around behind him.

The subplot of Julius, one of Marcus companions, could have been given even a stronger emphasis and we could have been allowed some indication that Marcus need not be the only person in near 2000 soldiers of Rome who can figure out a mystery. Riches though loses points for continuing to make his hero unbelievable at the expense of those where things could have been quite believable.

Once more, if you would like to read the exploits of the GOD like, comic book like superhero that is Marcus, this is for you. ( )