Londinium Mini Mysteries

The Roman Mini-Mysteries: The Legionary from Londinium by Caroline Lawrence is a collection of short stories which are really good. I liked how between every mini-mystery it said where it would come in her series of Roman Mystery books.

I went to see Caroline Lawrence give a talk at the Museum of London during half term which was very interesting. She explained how the books always use clues to help the four friends Flavia, Nubia, Lupus and Jonathan discover the solution to the mystery. For example a wax tablet had melted but somehow they figured out what it had said on it.

She also talked about the characters that were in it, and how they were classic ‘types’ that are in lots of stories such as the main hero, the wild one, the funny one and the sidekick and of course the enemy.

I really like this book because it was very intriguing and it always had me wondering what was going to happen next. All the stories were set in different places. At school we studied Roman London so I knew a bit about it already. Still it was very interesting.

In the book one of the mini-mysteries was that this man received five barley grains. Flavia helps the man find hidden treasure without even leaving her chair. Caroline Lawrence explained how the five barley grains was based on a Sherlock Holmes adventure where Sherlock Holmes unravels a mystery about five orange pips.

I give this book five out of five because I thought it was really good. This book is good for seven plus, because some bits are hard to understand for younger readers because it’s not set in the modern day times. However it is all very well explained. I recommend that you hear one of Caroline Lawrence’s speeches because they help you understand the books and are very interesting for everyone.