ELODIA’S KNIFE by Robert S. Phillips – Historical Fiction, Action/Adventure, Roman Empire

Elodia is a young woman driven by dreadful circumstances to act with deadly force in the Robert S. Phillips novel Elodia’s Knife.

What Elodia hoped would be her leap away from danger instead left her surrounded by perilous threats that now threaten to consume her. Armed with her courage, determination, instincts, and a trusty knife, Elodia faces a hostile world in foreign territory.

Not all are against her though. Allies– even a friend– can be found, if Elodia can summon the bravery to listen to her feelings and own deep wishes.

Young Elodia is unhappily married to an abusive husband. But when he tries to attack her again, she strikes back and kills him.

By her own hand, she is set free from a brutal life, yet not fully liberated. Now her husband’s family pursues her, intent on revenge. Elodia must flee for her life, driven into the unknown, alone across the Danube River. She can never return, but what she finds before her is a crumbling empire on the brink of war. They view her as one of the enemy, to be conquered and enslaved. Refusing to be bound again, she keeps her knife close at hand, and her wits about her at all times.

Elodia is captured upon landing by men who blame Gothic peoples, like her, for the troubles in the Western Roman Empire of the late 4^th century CE. But among them is Caius, who sees her in a different light.

He treats her not as a prisoner, but as a person. Is his compassion genuine? As he oversees the work he orders her to complete, that’s when she first notices his smile. A small smile, and a friendly one. Will Caius become a possible ally? Even someone she could trust? Or possibly more? Elodia allows hope to churn within her. But she cannot dwell on that hope alone. She will need to foster the strength to rise out of slavery in this foreign place.

Elodia takes thrilling actions to seize the day and take control– to lead a Roman city.

Elodia’s Knife surrounds readers with a vivid and riveting time in early history.

Author Phillips shows the fascinating details of how people of those times faced the challenges of life and a complex society. He skillfully weaves the decline of the Roman Empire– a world on the brink of collapse– into the pulse of this exquisite story.

Lives and times change, but human nature is at the heart of it all. The struggles of these characters leap off the page with fervor. Readers will cheer for Elodia as she fights with hope fueling her soul and Elodia’s Knife clutched, at the ready.