The family live across the street from a house where lots of poor Romans live together, because they cannot afford their own houses. Including two ex-slaves: Maddusbananus, who wants to be a millionaire from selling his inventions and Scorcha who shares Perilus’ ambition to become a charioteer. Perilus often sneaks out to the house across the road to practice chariot racing with Scorcha and some borrowed goats. Many disasters happen to the friends until one day Perilus is called upon to save the day while Scorcha is in jail. There are two mysteries to solve in this book. Who stole the money from the Imperial Mint? Who had tried to kidnap a chariot racer so he couldn’t win? All will be revealed after you read the book… John: I didn’t like the book because it was difficult to follow the story line and I found it rather dull. I was surprised not to enjoy it as I had read other books by Jeremy Strong before – like “The Hundred Mile and Hour Dog” which I really enjoyed. It is a story which is told through the eyes of a raven. He visits different places and meets different people like the emperor.

I like Jeremy Strong as an author because his stories are funny. I am reading at the moment his book called My Brothers Famous Bottom Gets Pinched!When he was about eighteen he started writing very serious stories for adults, but none of them were published. By the time he was twenty-one he was writing stories for children after realizing that he loved writing funny stories and making people laugh. This book was specifically related to history because of all the events which happened when the Romans arrived, happened in this book. For example, the book explained about chariot racing, how the machines we use now were made and how different our lives are from when the Romans lived. This book did make me want to learn more about this period of history because of the chariot racing. This sport interest me a lot and after you read the book I bet you will be interested too! The book did make me feel like I was in the roman times. I think that the history in the book is realistic, because of the characters names, the activities that they did and the description of their clothes although the story was sometimes a little hard to follow, but I did really like all the different characters because they were all very funny.

Antonina: I really enjoyed this book and read it in only three days. This book is about a boy called Perilus and a raven his pet. The raven does not have a name. I think my favourite place was the Villa because it was described well. It has a swimming pool and a bush growing in the middle of it. WHAT A GOOD PLACE TO LIVE!!!!!!! Perilus wanted to be a charioteer…BUT HE WAS PUT IN PRISON BECAUSE OF MAD PRACTICING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! His friend was an inventor and wanted to invent a tree that grows ships. CAN YOU BELIEVE IT!!!!!!!!!!!! Remember this is not all the fun!!!... This book is so interesting I give it five stars!!!!!!!!!! I chose this book because it’s funny and I’ve learnt some Latin. There’s a raven called croakbag and my favourite part is where the raven tells jokes. I really enjoyed this book because it is really funny and adventurous it makes you want read more and more. I thought that Tiddles the elephant was really cool and was extremely funny. The main character was Croakbag who told the story but was also in it. Croakbag was very clever and also told us a few things to impress your parents. I don't think this book set out to be realistic but it did make me want to read more about the Romans. I wouldn’t have chosen Jeremy Strong but this book has definitely made me think different about this author. I think this book is a really good read aimed at 6 - 10 year olds.I really enjoyed reading this book because it is full of humour and is different to other books I have read. Wherever I get up to in the book it always wants to make me read on. This book also helps me learn a bit of Latin. My favourite character in this book is Croakbag / raven. I like Croakbag because he is funny and never stops talking about biscuits, and also is very interactive with the audience in different parts of the story. I wonder, did Romans invent skateboards?