Okay. Hear me out...

Time travel? Kidnapping Julius Caesar? Taking him to Vegas?

Look, if you were interested in fairly accurate, nuanced historical fiction, you're in the wrong place. In fact, if you are looking for a well written, character driven portrayal of arguably one of the most famous characters of ancient history... again, you'll want to move along.

But. If you are anong those rare, privledged few whose suspension of believe and ability to wade thru odd plot changes and unnecessary sequences of action scenes evocative of 50's westerns... you, my friend, have arrived. Welcome.

In all seriousness, I think Edwards made the right choice in not sticking closely to actual history. This is purely an adventure/love story á la Bill & Ted, without the cheesy humor.

I actually listened to this in audiobook form. Perso ally, if it sounds interesting, you should just pick up a copy. The reader is sadly utilitarian, with no real feeling placed, and odd pronunciations that took me out of the story.

My thanks to Net Galley for a free copy of the audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

Liked the book and gave a separate review for the book. The narrator on this title was very hard to listen to. I was able to bump the listening speed up higher than normal to get through it.
My full review is up now. https://youtu.be/3SglZ8xVDuk

This review is based on the audiobook version/presentation of the story as I did a combination of read/listen to this book.

I listen to all books at 1.5x speed. The audiobook version gave weird reverb when speeding it up. I did eventually grow use to it but it took quite some time. The actual performance (vs technical side) was good but the narrator was a bit on the slow/drawn-out speaking side, which is common for audiobooks but slower than many I've listen to. This wouldn't have hurt the performance at all if the technical side of things wouldn't have hindered the enjoyment of listening with the weird reverb issue.

Overall, I enjoyed the book (posting actual review on the ebook vs audiobook) and think due to technical issues of audiobook, I would recommend reading vs listening.

Thanks to the publisher - Imbifrex Books for providing ARC in exchange for an honest review via NetGalley.

3/5 stars

A Coin for the Ferryman by Megan Edwards is a time travel story. The plot of the story goes like this: there is this scientist who invents the machine that can bring back a living thing from the past to our present-day for a specified period of time, the only catch being that the person must be seconds from death and be returned to that very moment so as to not upset the history that comes after. They decide to bring in Julius Caesar from the past. Now, the question is - will they be able to return him back to his time successfully without altering the future? You have to read to find out for yourselves.

I liked the various characters in the story, in particular, I loved reading about Cassandra. I was impressed with the use of Latin phrases in the texts inside the story. I listened to the audiobook narration of the book which was amazing as it brought all the more feel to the adventure that was needed for the setting.

There were unnecessary details that were irrelevant. There were too many descriptions of the things I was least interested in. The story was uselessly dragged to a thick book that could have been cut to a short and crisp one.

It was a fun, light, thrilling, and adventurous read and I would recommend this to SciFi junkies out there
Release Date: 01 Mar 2022.

Review Posted: 13 Mar 2022.

My thanks to Imbrifex Books Audio for a review copy via NetGalley of the unabridged audiobook edition of ‘A Coin for the Ferryman’ by Megan Edwards in exchange for an honest review. The audiobook was narrated by Mark Ashby.

I read this book without prior knowledge and was surprised when it opened with Julius Caesar waking on the morning of the Ides of March 44BC and being warned frantically by his wife, Calpurnia, of danger.

He reaches the Theatre of Pompey and is approached by someone who begins to speak then nothing “not only silent, but gone—along with the stench of garum and garlic. In his place was Venus, gazing into Caesar’s eyes and reaching her hands toward him.” Definitely an intriguing start.

In 1999, 26-year old classics student Cassandra Fleury is plucked from her life in Las Vegas to become the youngest member of the IDES Project, an interdisciplinary team engaged in a groundbreaking experiment involving time-travel.

Their plan is to snatch Julius Caesar moments prior to his assassination, hold him in seclusion and involve him in discussions with historians and Latin scholars. Cassandra, who is fluid in Latin, is to serve both as the translator and as hostess. Indeed, Caesar initially mistakes her for Venus. After four days they will return him to the moment he was extracted in order to preserve the timeline.

What could possibly go wrong? These folk have clearly not encountered any time travel fiction! No further details to avoid spoilers but it certainly proved an interesting plot with some great action sequences, twists, a compelling lead in Cassandra and a fascinating portrayal of Caesar.

‘A Coin for the Ferryman’ was clearly a labour of love as Megan Edwards writes in her Acknowledgements that this novel has taken twenty years to write. In addition, she was a Classics major and had taught Latin for many years so knows her subject.

With respect to the audiobook, while Mark Ashby is an experienced voice actor, I initially found his American accent jarring. This faded once I got further into the story though on occasion it still felt out of place.

Overall, I found this an enjoyable ‘what if’ time travel novel with an informed portrayal of Julius Caesar at its heart and some fascinating ideas throughout. I definitely will be interested in reading more of her writings.

Definitely recommended for readers seeking something a little different.

Wow I liked this book way more than I thought I would. I don't know anything about Julius Caesar other than what I learned from watching HBO Rome. This was a great sci-fi story, history lesson, thriller, and a little bit of romance all wrapped up in one great story. I really felt by the end that Caesar was actually brought to life in the story. The Ides of March definitely hit differently now.

My real criticism of this book is how long it takes to really take off. For me, the first half was a 3/5 and the 2nd half a 5/5, hence my final rating of 4/5. It was very frustrating listening to hours of set-up for the event we all knew was coming.

But overall I would definitely recommend this. I actually already recommended it to someone before I even finished it.

Thank you netgalley and Imbrifex Books for giving me an advanced review copy of this audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

I really didn't like the narrator, he was very slow even on high speed. I will stick with just reading the ebook.

This book was nothing like I expected and unfortunately I was not able to stay invested enough to finish it

I love the premise which I believe could be turned into a series where various points in history are explored. The main issue I had with this book is that it was way too long. If the books was cut down a bit I think it would of greatly improved it overall. Way too slow for my liking and It did not capitalize on the excitement of the time period properly. I will check out the author’s next book and hopefully it is more focused and edited a bit better.

Thanks to Netgalley and Imbrifex Books who sent me an ARC audiobook of this book in exchange for my honest review.

The story A Coin for the Ferryman by Megan Edwards took place in 1999. Scientist Andrew Danicheck created a way to bring things through time. He selected a team of the top minds to run his program. After success with non-living and animal subjects, they moved on to a human subject. Their human subject was Julius Caesar. They reached back to that fateful day on the Ides of March and pulled him into the present. With a small team that studied Latin and ancient Rome, they hoped to gain some insight into these times and the famous man. However not everything goes as planned, things quickly spiral out of control. They are left wondering what will happen if Caesar doesn't return to the past?
This is a very character driven book. Almost the first half of the book is background on the characters and the project. However, once Caesar arrives Megan Edwards does not disappoint. She finds a way to bring him to life in a simple and believable manner. She presents him as highly intelligent, confident, and bold. However, as the story progresses, we see other sides as well, playful and inquisitive. The man she builds encourages readers to both hate and love him and feel a whole gambit of emotions along the way!
A Coin for the Ferryman also addressed the implications of changes in the past and their effects in the future. Edward finds a way to make this heavy topic intriguing. She places little nuggets in the story and implies these situations only happened because of the project. Leaving readers to wonder what would have happened if the project never existed.
I really enjoyed this book. It was a refreshing take on time travel. Her choice of Julius Caesar really added an interesting spin to the book. The characters were well developed, so readers could understand all their actions. The merger of facts and opinions of Caesar's character was both thought provoking and entertaining.
My only dislike of the book was that the first half dragged for me. I felt like some of the character background stories could have been left out without really taking away substance from the book. There were a few backstories of characters which did lead to an understanding of their present actions, but they were often drawn out, uneventful and ultimately unnecessary. I really felt like the book would have been better off shortened with less backstory. Despite being a book about time travel, the science is not there. The focus is on the characters and history. It would have been nice to have some type of weak scientific explanation for time travel.
Mark Ashby narrated the book. His voice sounded professional and brisk like a journalist exposing a story, which was perfect considering the premise is that the book was written as a true story released as fiction for legal reasons. He does a great job bringing out the various characters in the book. His pace is steady, and his tone and inflection only add to the feelings brought out by the characters dialog in the book.
I would rate this book 4 out of 5 stars. It is well written and highly engaging. However, as I mentioned previously, part of the book seems to drag. I would highly recommend this book to fans of historical fiction and time travel.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Imbrifex Books for this audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

I love anything ancient Greece or ancient Rome. A Coin for the Ferryman's premise appealed to me. The beginning of the book was slow. You're getting to know the members of the group that is trying to bring Julius Caesar to contemporary times. Some of them were interesting, the rest were uninteresting. After character introductions and setting up the project, the pace quickened. The focus on the cast of characters dwindles down to a handful then really focuses on Caesar and his translator, Cassandra. The second half of the book hooked me and I had to see it to the end. Cassandra was an intriguing character and glad that she played a prominent part of the book.

It has always been intriguing for me to imagine having the opportunity to meet and talk to anyone from the past. How would all the parties act? How would the interaction go? Megan Edwards clearly thought about when writing this novel. Caesar was very similar to how history has depicted him, which in turns makes the whole situation quite plausible. I liked that Edwards sprinkled Caesar's thoughts and memories throughout the story. It was an adventure like if one would take Caesar out for the day, weaving past and with the present. The action made the story more interactive then just having Caesar over for dinner and talking to him. I appreciated the smaller details Edwards incorporated like using roman numerals for labeling the chapters and Caesar saying phrases that were eventually associated with him.

All those classicists and Julius Caesar buffs, who enjoy sci-fi and fantasy books, this is the book for you. The audiobook narrator, Mark Ashby, did a fantastic job too.

This was too everything for me: too long, too unnecessarily detailed, too many characters. After reading the synopsis, I was intrigued. I love historical fiction (Julius Caesar) with time periods I know little about. While science fiction (love to watch) and romance genres are equally my least favorite, the time travel had me request to read.

Unfortunately, not only couldn't I connect with any part of the story, I couldn't follow all the nonsensical details. Which leads me to not being able to spoil. After starting the book twice, sitting focused on the performance I threw in the towel. The narration was off. The news voice gave me War of the World vibes, and it doesn't work. A different type of voice, less sports announcing and more storytelling, could potentially push the story.

Ultimately, two stars even though I didn't finish, on the chance the story appeals to someone else with the synopsis given and they can follow it.

Thank you NetGalley for accepting my request to read and review A Coin for the Ferryman.

I am not generally a fan of books on time travel; I find them so steeped in science and theory that it’s hard for me to appreciate the rest of the book. Not so with A Coin for the Ferryman, an enjoyable story that focuses more on the characters and events across time than on the scientific aspects of getting Julius Caesar to the present day and then back to the Ides of March.

The story built slowly, and for a while I wondered if A Coin for the Ferryman would live up to my expectations. There are a lot of characters introduced at the beginning of the book, which was somewhat difficult for me to keep track of with the audio version. While I don’t mind solo audiobook narrators, I think this one could benefit from a cast. I did go back and listen again, to help me remember each character’s story (this is the only point where I found myself thinking that print would be better, but it’s an important one). Getting to know more of Cassandra’s story was a turning point for me, then I became invested in the rest of the book and eager for any opportunity to listen. There was some general explanation of the development of the IDES program, how time travel would work, and why Julius Caesar was chosen, but again it was not so heavy on the theory that it was inaccessible. Overall, I chose not to question any of that for my own enjoyment of the story.

I was disappointed to initially find Caesar an easy character to dislike. There are other unlikeable characters, but I really wanted more from Caesar. There were also seemingly eccentric characters, of course the super intelligent ones, and the kind characters it is easy to adore. Some of them, like Caesar, earn multiple of those distinctions.

The story is helped along by telling parts of each character’s history, mostly in the recent past, that link to the “present day” part of the story as well as a good dose of action and suspense. The brain tingles really begin as the story nears its conclusion and the disparate parts start to come together and reveal some surprises. I started a second listen almost immediately and discovered even more details that I missed the first time through. It is definitely an enjoyable listen, and I will be interested to pick it up in print, as well.

I am so delighted that my request to listen to this book was granted! It might be one of the best books I’ve ever read. I do not say that lightly. I honestly didn’t have much of a thought about this title other than, that premise seems cool.
If you could bring back any historical figure, would you? And who would it be? Apparently the space/time continuum was cracked in 1999 w/ The IDES project. And Julius Caesar visited the modern world for 4 days. This novel is an account of those 4 days and the events leading up to those 4 days. But is it actually a work of fiction or could this have happened? Has Megan Edwards let us in on an amazing scientific & historical secret OR has she just crafted one of the most brilliant works of fiction to date? Full of heart, history and humor, I cannot recommend A Coin for the Ferryman enough. An absolute pleasure to read.

*Special thanks to Imbrifex Books and NetGalley for this early audio version.*

Cassandra Flurry has wanted to study classics at a university for most of her life. So when a chance encounter turns into the opportunity she's been waiting, she jumps at the chance. Better yet, in a manner of months, she's invited to join an elite team of academics working on a top secret project. Her unique skills throw her into an adventure involving time travel and one of history's most well-known figures.

The premise of "A Coin for the Ferryman" is intriguing: if we could pull any person in history to our time, who would it be? And how would they, and we, handle it? As a soft scifi adventure with a strong female lead, I was ready to love this book.

Unfortunately, the promise of the book is never fulfilled. In some ways, I identified with the main character despite her a-little-too-perfect smarts, looks, and serendipitous circumstances. But even though she's decidedly the MC, the book tries to fit an ensemble of other characters into the tale through time jumps, flashbacks, and POV switching. The result is that the main chunk of the story doesn't really get going until at least halfway through.

Because of this meandering, the antagonist also does not show up until late in the game, resulting in the antagonism of a secondary female character who's biggest flaw is that she has normal human emotions. The other upshot is that the climax and resolution is rushed, with summaries of each character's fate coming at the reader like the text scroll at the end of biopic.

I had high hopes in the beginning, but I spent most of my time listening to the audiobook wondering why we're meandered down the path of yet another character backstory, and when was it all going to end.

I really liked this book. There were a lot of connections that were nice and added a lot of layers to the story. However, because it was so long, and it's hard to go back and find places again with an audiobook, some of the early details are forgotten by the time they are relevant again. I liked the multiple perspectives, but would have liked to see more of Faith's perspective as the book went along. I think she had a lot of good points about time travel but was pushed to the side after the fallout with Andrew.
I really liked how much thought was put into how time travel would work, with people speaking different languages, having different immune systems,, different ways of life, etc. In a lot of scifi that's not the important part, which can lead to plot holes, but that was avoided very skillfully in this book.
Overall, 4 out of 5 stars.

Thanks to Netgalley for a free copy in exchange for an honest review. I liked the story overall, but some of the backstories got a little long. The first half felt a bit jumbled with all of the new people coming in, but things got clearer in the middle and the last quarter was very good.

“He Came. He Saw. She Conquered.” Call me a geek, but I think Latin could make a comeback.

Special Thanks to Imbrifex Books and NetGalley for this little gem. An ARC for a review? I’ll take it!
*disclaimer*
I am a reader. Not a writer. So keep your expectations low here.

Let’s get the trigger warnings out of the way: all super benign but they were there…prostitution, gambling, abduction, mild violence.

I had no idea what I was getting into. I was in a reading slump and decided to randomly pic an ARC. This book completely caught me off guard.

A couple things about me that may have played a large role in my appreciation for this book…I took Latin in HS and have always been obsessed with Roman culture. As a whovian, I’m a sucker for time travel. And as a woman married to a silver Fox, I dig the older man trope. So when it came to a story about scientists who travel back in time to ‘borrow’ Julius Caesar for a few days who in the process falls in love with his much younger translator…did I mention it was a slow burn? yea. I see you Megan Edwards.

This book was very well written and I adored the use of an classical language in a sci fi novel. I wasn’t a huge fan of all the characters backstories nor did I think all of them were necessary. However they were secondary characters, so it didn’t take too much away.

Aside from a brief moment when I actually jotted down “stop being so soft” in my notebook, I loved Cassandra and her journey. Underestimated and understated yet brilliant she went through some serious phases in the book. I loved her approach to relationships and her attitude toward life.

My favorite character, hands down, was Caesar. His inner monologues were amazing. He strategically didn’t speak much so I found myself anxiously waiting for the next time the book switched to his POV so I could hear what he really felt about what was happening to him. I know the exact moment when I fell in love…When he was complaining about Cassandra’s incessant need to fill moments of silence. A close second was when he banished Faith from breakfast for being a harlot. He was great.

This would be a great Book Club read. So many questions to discuss like knowing about how we’re going to die. If you could kidnap one historical figure who would be? What would you ask? If you had a choice would you have stayed?

I can’t give it 5 stars because it wasn’t perfect, but I did thoroughly enjoy it. So 4.5 stars feels right. Give it a whirl!

If you could pick anyone dead or alive to have dinner with, who would it be? In A Coin for the Ferryman, that person is Julius Caesar.

This is a time travel novel that takes place in the recent past – 1999. A Nobel laureate physicist has cracked time travel, the only catch is they must know the exact time and place the person they want to bring to the future has died. There are quite a few options that would make sense, JFK, Lincoln, but none spark the same fascination as Julius Caesar. This novel tells the story of Caesar’s travel to 1999 for 4 days, and as one would expect, things don’t go to plan.

This is an interesting novel to review, because it has a lot going for it, but it does have its pitfalls. First, I could tell a lot of time, effort, and research went into this novel, and upon my own curiosity I found out the author has a degree in classics and has been working on this book for 20 years. The love and passion shows, and I’m very happy for this author getting her novel published.

With that being said, I think the novel is a bit too long. It’s 540 pages and I think it could be edited down, maybe taken 100 pages out. There are a lot of POVs – essentially every character we see had at least 1 POV chapter, but I don’t think it was all necessary. I will say, Edwards ties each character up in the end, but I didn’t think it all impacted to the primary arch of the story. There was a large section in the beginning of the novel that gives backstory to the physicist Andrew Danicek and team members with smaller roles, but it took a while for me to figure out how it connected to the larger story and I almost DNF’d it if I’m being honest. I’m very glad I continued reading this story, but I wish some of that would have been taken out. I did feel some satisfaction once I got to the end, but again it would not have missed it if it had not been there in the first place.

Once we get into the meat of the novel and encounter our main character, Cassandra, and Caesar I was really into this book and got through it so quickly. It reads very cinematically, and I could see it easily being adapted into a movie – think the likes of Angels and Demons or The Da Vinci Code. We have a fun historical character, an attempted kidnapping, romance – it has a lot going on, but I ate it up and would LOVE to see it on screen!

Another thing I loved is the chapters are really short. This novel is long, but the short chapters make it move pretty quick. I’ll also say this is 100% a plot driven novel. That isn’t normally my cup of tea, but again, I was into it, and it’s probably because I’m interested in ancient Greece and Rome. If you’re looking for huge character development, or not interested in Caesar, move along.

This novel sits somewhere between a 3.5-4 star for me. It originally was more like DNF-2 star, but it got a lot better as it went and I can appreciate the way the author ended it. If you can suspend your disbelief, hang with a little corniness in the ending, and like a lot of plot, this novel could be for you!

I wasn't sure about the narrator at first, but his performance grew on me and I really enjoyed it by the end. I think since our main character was a woman, I would have enjoyed a female narrator in addition or instead though.

Thank you to NetGalley and Imbrifex Books for the advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I wasn't entirely sure what to expect going into this. A plot to bring Julius Caesar to the future to learn from him? Very strange. But the way this was written -- I absolutely loved this book. It took a little while to get going. We see Caesar for a second in the very beginning, then it moves to present-day and introduces the modern characters. At first, I was impatient for Caesar to come fully into the narrative, but once we got to Cassandra's backstory I was sucked right in. She is such a wonderful character, and following her story was engrossing. I liked the way Edwards weaves all the modern characters together so we get the full picture of how this whole wacky project came to be, and then we add in Julius Caesar and it becomes a ride.

I think if you are going into this book looking for a serious, literary take on what Julius Caesar thinks about the modern world, this book will not be for you. If you go into it to see the absolute chaos that unfolds if you bring a famous general from 2000 years ago to modern LA/Las Vegas, then you will enjoy this book.

The audio narration was very well done, with only a dew places that I could tell had been weirdly spliced together. The voice actor does a great job of bringing these characters to life, which is no mean feat when one of them is literally Julius Caesar. I sometimes had trouble distinguishing his voices for the different male characters, but I made it though okay.

I am so glad I listened to this book -- I finished it in one day and it made my trips to and from work (as well as one grocery shopping trip) very delightful. There are some laugh-out-loud (and maybe worry some other grocery shoppers whoops) moments, which is just the icing on the cake for me. Highly recommend.