Vita & the Gladiator

A rip-roaring Roman mystery from Historical Association Young Quills Award-winning author Ally Sherrick. PRAISE FOR BLACK POWDER – WINNER OF THE HISTORIAL ASSOCIATION YOUNG QUILLS AWARD: ‘ … a wonderfully explosive adventure set in the turbulent year of the gunpowder plot in Black Powder with impossibly divided loyalties.’ JULIA GOLDING, AUTHOR OF THE DIAMOND OF DRURY LANE ‘With its constant reversals and twists and turns, Tom’s story is almost as complex as the pliot and counter-plot of the Gunpowder Treason itself …

The writing is lively and the pace never flags.’ HISTORICAL NOVEL SOCIETY Vita longs to write plays and poetry – but as a high-born girl in Roman Londinium, her fate is sealed: marriage and children. Then her father is murdered, her mother and brother disappear, and Vita flees from a shadowy enemy. Disguised as a slave at the gladiator’s arena, she forges an unlikely bond with Brea, a native Briton gladiatrix – and her wolf.

Together, they resolve to discover and bring the killer to justice before Vita’s identity is revealed … A rip-roaring adventure set in Roman London from the rising queen of middle-grade historical fiction, Ally Sherrick Vita, nicknamed ‘Little Owl’ by her father, is an unlikely hero – but when her father is murdered she has to uncover the truth, even if it means finding unlikely friends Themes of deceit, storytelling and fighting justice