The Beacon at Alexandria

Hi everybody. Book review time. You know you're excited; you're just holding it in. Ok, enough chit chat. On to the review. The Beacon at Alexandria by Gillian Bradshaw is set during the last few years of the Roman empire. It tells the story of an upper-class Roman girl who runs away from an arranged marriage. The husband-to-be is a cruel man, and she hates and fears him. (Of course, he has to be cruel or she wouldn't have to run away, right?) Anyway, she is able to disappear with the help of her brother, who also hates the prospective groom, and her nursemaid. Since she has always been interested in science and medicine, she disguises herself as a man and goes to the medical school in Alexandria, which is in modern-day Egypt. The story follows her through her adventures in medical school and then as a military doctor on the frontier of the Roman empire.

I don't know if a girl could really get away with something like that during that time or if her brother would go along with it, but what the heck. The book is a pretty good read, and I enjoyed it.