Everyone knows science fiction began with Verne, or Shelley, or maybe Gulliver...but they are wrong by at least sixteen centuries.

During one of my wide-ranging bouts of curiosity, I found myself wondering something oddly specific: Who wrote the first science fiction story? Not mythic epics like the Iliad or the Odyssey—those were presented to their audiences as history. I mean a story that was explicitly intended to be fiction, openly invented for the joy of invention.

Lucian of Samosata—Syrian, satirist, and the most entertaining liar of the second century—wrote the first story that admitted it was fiction and reveled in it: a voyage to the Moon, complete with space battles. But his real life was as astonishing as anything he invented. Lucian of Samosata follows him from a stonecutter's apprenticeship on the Euphrates across the breadth of the Roman Empire—trading philosophies with Platonists, Stoics, Epicureans, and Christians, dodging what the empire's roads and seas throw at him, and showing, city by city, how a boy from the edge of the map became the man who taught the world to lie truthfully.

Part history, part imagination, part affectionate lie—extensively researched where the record allows, invented where it doesn't. Lucian would approve. With more than 200 illustrations and a chronology of Lucian's world.

Lucian's Boyhood

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 4/26/2026		Page Views: 25
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Samosata #Syria #EasternRomanEmpire #LucianofSamosata
Life in the Eastern Roman Empire in the 2nd Century.
Estimated reading time: 11 minute(s) (2502 words)

Life in the eastern Roman Empire of the 2nd century CE would feel far less alien to us than we might expect: people lived in bustling cities with paved streets, public baths, piped water, sewers, bakeries, markets, libraries, theaters, and a rhythm of daily routines that included work, errands, socializing, and entertainment. They enjoyed hot meals from street vendors, shopped for household goods, sent letters, complained about taxes, attended public events, and relied on a shared infrastructure that kept water flowing and waste carried away. In many ways, their world was a recognizable urban civilization—orderly, interconnected, and full of the same small comforts and civic conveniences we tend to assume are modern—and for someone like our boy Lucian, it was simply the normal texture of everyday life.

The Road To Antioch

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 4/27/2026		Page Views: 19
Hashtags: #History #LucianofSamosata #Zeugma #Antioch #Beroea
Lucian heads out to see the world.
Estimated reading time: 14 minute(s) (3243 words)

Lucian ran home, only to find his father had already rented out his childhood bedroom to a stranger! His father wouldn't even talk to him, having stormed out when his brother-in-law sent word that his son had been "let go". Lucian's sister was sympathetic but helpless. "I never saw Daddy so angry," she said. "I think he was counting on the money from the rental."

Aphrodite's Favor

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 4/28/2026		Page Views: 19
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Antioch #Ephesus
Lucian's first trip across the Mediterranean to Ephesus.
Estimated reading time: 14 minute(s) (3224 words)

Lucian and Demetrios rose before dawn, gathered their belongings, and headed for the harbor at Seleucia, the port that served Antioch, by following the smell of fish and rope and the sound of seabirds. The harbor was a chaos of vessels—merchant ships with their broad, rounded hulls; a few faster biremes with their double rows of oars; fishing boats; ferries. Men swarmed everywhere, carrying amphorae, bundles of cloth, baskets of dried fruit, herding sheep and cattle down the gangways. Even at that hour, the noise was tremendous and incomprehensible.

Plato's Shadows

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 4/30/2026		Page Views: 16
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Smyrna #PlatonicPhilosophy
Lucian learns about Platonism at a lecture in Smyrna.
Estimated reading time: 15 minute(s) (3361 words)

Lucian blinked. "We're to be paid for telling stories?" That had bought him lodging on the road; but he'd had no idea it would work that way in a big city. If he could do that in a different residence every day, he might never have to work!

The Stoics of Smyrna

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/1/2026		Page Views: 19
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Smyrna #Stoicism #Philosophy
Lucian encounters Stoicism and discovers Demetrios' secret.
Estimated reading time: 12 minute(s) (2745 words)

Philostratos's house was not as grand as Hippias's, but it was comfortable in the way of a man who lived well without ostentation—the furniture was fine but worn, the walls displayed an excellent collection of portrait busts, and the dining room opened onto a small courtyard where herbs grew in terra cotta pots. When Lucian and Demetrios arrived at dusk, slaves were already lighting oil lamps, and the air carried the smell of bread baking in the kitchen, mingled with the scent of rosemary and olive oil.

The Epicureans of Miletus

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/2/2026		Page Views: 15
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Miletus #Epicureanism #Philosophy #LucianofSamosata
Lucian learns philosophy, pleasure, consent, and the difference between lust and love.
Estimated reading time: 14 minute(s) (3142 words)

The ship from Smyrna had brought them down the Ionian coast in three days, putting in twice for water and once for a cargo of olive oil. Lucian, who had not yet learned how much he disliked the rolling motion of a coaster running close inshore, spent most of the second day standing at the rail counting the dolphins that ran with them and trying not to think about his stomach. Demetrios, who had been at sea since he was nine and had the stomach for any weather, brought him bread and watered wine when it became clear no sympathy was going to come from the deck crew.

Meet the Christians

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/3/2026		Page Views: 32
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Miletus #Christianity #EarlyChurch #LucianofSamosata
Lucian encounters a Christian woman and follows her to a service.
Estimated reading time: 12 minute(s) (2728 words)

It was in the middle of the night that Lucian woke suddenly. He had been too enrapt in the subject to have noticed her consciously, but there had been a woman at that lecture, he was certain of it! What was she doing there? She didn't seem to be serving, and she wore the clothes of a free woman. So, why? She had been sitting near the back of the garden, listening with the kind of focused attention that suggested she was actually engaging with the ideas rather than merely passing time. And when Kallimachos had made a joke about the absurdity of pursuing wealth, she had laughed as if she understood.

The Mithraic Temple

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/4/2026		Page Views: 18
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Mithraism #MysteryReligions #Christianity #Pergamum
Lucian encounters the mysteries of Mithras and recognizes Christianity's debts to older faiths.
Estimated reading time: 10 minute(s) (2186 words)

The city of Pergamum sat on a steep hillside overlooking the plain, and like many cities in Asia Minor, it was a layering of empires. Here the Seleucids had built a great library to rival Alexandria's. Here the Attalids had ruled before Rome absorbed their kingdom. And here, in narrow streets that descended from the Temple of Athena to the marketplace below, the worship of Mithras had taken deep root—particularly among the soldiers and merchants who filled the garrison and the harbor.

Sophists: 2, Cynics: 0

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/5/2026		Page Views: 16
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Ephesus #Sophistry #Satire #Comedy
Lucian discovers his voice as a satirist and learns the power of gentle critique.
Estimated reading time: 10 minute(s) (2374 words)

Three years in Ephesus dissolved one to the other like rain into the harbor. Lucian moved through the city's gymnasia and lecture halls like a man learning to breathe in a new atmosphere. By day, he studied with the sophists—men who taught the art of persuasion, the craft of words, the intricate dance of rhetoric. He read Homer until he could recite the entire Iliad without stumbling. He studied Plato until he understood not just what the man had written, but the gaps between what Plato claimed and what Plato actually believed. He learned the comic poets— Aristophanes especially—and began to understand that there was a kind of truth that could only be told slantwise, through humor, through exaggeration, through the distorting mirror of satire.

Funeral For A Friend

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/6/2026		Page Views: 9
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Travel #Rhetoric #Mediterranean #MiddleSea
Lucian buries his mentor and embarks on his world tour as a famous rhetorician.
Estimated reading time: 13 minute(s) (3016 words)

By the time Lucian was twenty-eight, he had become a fixture of Ephesian intellectual life. The scandal of Open Mikon Night had, paradoxically, enhanced rather than damaged his reputation. Everyone in the city knew about the Stoic-Cynic brawl. And everyone wanted to see the young man who had sparked it. His performances grew more sophisticated, more subtle, more carefully aimed at absurdity rather than at individual men. The wealthy merchants who had paid sophists to teach them rhetoric now paid Lucian to entertain them at dinner parties. The gymnasium invited him to lecture. Even Philostratos, that most demanding of critics, had begun to attend his performances regularly, and always with an expression of satisfied approval.

Syria Conquers Rome

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/7/2026		Page Views: 19
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Rome #Rhetoric #Slavery #CulturalUnderstanding
Lucian faces criticism in Rome, learns from an enslaved man's wisdom, and discovers the power of embracing difference.
Estimated reading time: 11 minute(s) (2563 words)

The house that Demetrios had rented came with three slaves. This was not unusual for Rome—even a modest house of this class typically came furnished with domestic help. What was unusual was that Lucian had never lived with slaves before. In the Greek cities, slavery existed, certainly, but it was not as systematized, not as complete a part of the social infrastructure. Here in Rome, slavery was not an aberration but the foundation upon which the entire society was built. The three slaves—a cook, a cleaner, and a general attendant—moved through the house with the quiet efficiency of people who understood that their bodies belonged to someone else, and that this was simply how the world was ordered.

Freedom Isn't Free

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/8/2026		Page Views: 38
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Rome #Slavery #Bureaucracy #Freedom
Lucian attempts to buy a slave's freedom and discovers that bureaucracy is more complicated than generosity.
Estimated reading time: 12 minute(s) (2631 words)

Lucian woke to sunlight and the particular happiness that comes from being exactly where you want to be, with exactly the person you want to be with. For a moment he simply lay there, aware of Demetrios sleeping beside him, aware of the warmth of another body, aware of the fact that for the first time in his life, he felt like he belonged somewhere. Not to a place. To a person.

Bad Air

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/11/2026		Page Views: 69
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Corsica #Trauma #Slavery
Lucian brings Tanno to an island haunted by his past.
Estimated reading time: 13 minute(s) (3077 words)

The voyage from Rome to Massilia would have taken perhaps three days if Lucian and Demetrios had been in a hurry. But they were not, so they booked with a merchant vessel that hugged the coast, stopping at small ports to pick up cargo and passengers, which meant the journey stretched out to nearly two weeks. It was, Lucian realized, the perfect arrangement. The ship would dock overnight at cities large enough to have a theater or gymnasium, and Lucian could perform. The money he made paid for their passage and their lodging, and Demetrios had or made contacts in each port who could arrange venues and spread word of the "famous Syrian" rhetorician's arrival.

My Fair Laddy

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/12/2026		Page Views: 45
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Massilia #Gaul #LucianofSamosata
In Massilia, Lucian gives Tanno a makeover.
Estimated reading time: 17 minute(s) (3847 words)

They had been at sea for almost four days when the lookout shouted that land was visible. Lucian, who had been belowdecks helping Tanno practice his letters, emerged into the bright Mediterranean sun to find the entire crew lined along the rail, pointing ahead. The coast was a low brown line on the horizon, barely distinguishable from the sea itself, but as the ship drew closer, it began to resolve into something solid, real, a place that existed in more than just Demetrios' descriptions.

That's Entertainment!

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/13/2026		Page Views: 27
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Gaul #Tanno #Language #Lugdunum
Lucian discovers the beauty of Gaulish, and the value of Tanno's voice.
Estimated reading time: 17 minute(s) (3897 words)

The suggestion to leave Massilia came from Demetrios. They had been in the city for five weeks. The performances had been successful; Lucian had been celebrated as a master of rhetoric, and his purse was heavy with the proceeds. But one thing gnawed at him in a way he had not expected: everyone still wanted to talk about the one evening his slave had sung. Tanno had performed exactly once, at Kallias' feast, and had sworn he would never do it again—yet all of Massilia spoke of it as though Lucian had uncovered a vein of silver in a mine.

An Unexpected Reunion

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/14/2026		Page Views: 13
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Gaul #Tanno #Brigid #Reunion #Freedom #LucianofSamosata
Tanno meets his long-lost daughter after twenty-two years.
Estimated reading time: 12 minute(s) (2696 words)

In the chaos after the song, with Tanno still standing in the center of the courtyard and the crowd still processing what they had heard, Lucian expected the woman to rush forward. To embrace him. To weep with relief and joy at whatever reunion this moment promised.

Girl, Interruption

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/15/2026		Page Views: 17
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Hispania #Tarraco #Venatio #Mari #Basque #Vascon
Lucian gets an unexpected offer from a mysterious woman.
Estimated reading time: 13 minute(s) (2917 words)

The merchant ship that brought them down the Rhône arrived at Tarraco in the late afternoon. Lucian stood at the rail as the city resolved itself from the Mediterranean haze—a proper Roman port, with an amphitheatre visible on the hillside beyond the harbor, and the bustle of traders and dock workers that marked any serious city. Demetrios stood beside him, one hand on the rigging, watching the crew prepare to dock.

The Rain in Hispania (Isn't Mainly on The Plana)

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/16/2026		Page Views: 58
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Hispania #Vasconi
The travelers are attacked by bandits as they journey inland toward the Pyrenees.
Estimated reading time: 11 minute(s) (2495 words)

The road inland from Tarraco led through a landscape that seemed to exist between civilization and wilderness. Olive groves gave way to cork oak forests, and those in turn to rolling hills dotted with stone farmsteads and shepherds' huts. The clear air of the Middle Sea gave way to the smell of earth and pine. Mountains rose in the distance, still hazed with afternoon light on the first day, but closer by evening.

Sleepless in Pompelo

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/17/2026		Page Views: 51
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Pompelo #Vasconi #LucianofSamosata
Lucian finds love and instructs the Vascones in passive resistance.
Estimated reading time: 12 minute(s) (2843 words)

Pompelo was not a large city, but it was orderly in a way that spoke of Roman efficiency. The streets were laid out in a grid. The forum was surrounded by colonnaded shops. There were soldiers at the gate, checking travelers, watching the crowd with the narrowed eyes of men who knew that not everyone here loved Rome. Which was, Lucian would later learn, something of an understatement.

A Mysterious Traveler

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/18/2026		Page Views: 15
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Caesaraugusta #Ebro #LucianofSamosata
Lucian and Demetrios escape Pompelo and encounter a mysterious stranger.
Estimated reading time: 14 minute(s) (3307 words)

They were gathered in Mari's private quarters late in the afternoon—Lucian, Demetrios, and Mari, with the door firmly closed. The household staff had learned not to disturb them when Mari wished privacy. Outside, the soldiers of Pompelo were slowly beginning to understand the implications of Lucian's speech. Inside, three people were deciding how to make sure he lived long enough to give more of them.

The Ghosts of Celtiberia

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/19/2026		Page Views: 20
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Toletum #Hispania #Numantia #Clunia
Lucian and Demetrios ride across Hispania toward Toletum and an unexpected encounter.
Estimated reading time: 9 minute(s) (1941 words)

The Blue Anchor's proprietor provided them with good advice and supplies for the road. The Roman road north from Caesaraugusta was direct and well-maintained, he said, following the old trade routes that had connected the city to the northern settlements long before Rome came. "You'll make good time," he assured them. "The roads are safe. You'll see soldiers, but that's because Rome keeps them safe. You have nothing to fear if you're honest travelers."

A Fistful of Denarii

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/20/2026		Page Views: 15
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Consabura #Eclipse #Celtiberian #Roman #Denarii #Hispania #Spain #LucianofSamosata
Lucian finds himself caught between two warring factions in the town of Consabura.
Estimated reading time: 10 minute(s) (2356 words)

The mysterious man from the boat was gone by the time they came down for breakfast. The landlord, when pressed—and after accepting a few coins as lubricant—admitted that he thought the man might be some kind of courier. An imperial one, perhaps. He had first appeared a few months previous, and had passed through Toletum, every few weeks or so, since. Always moving south with great urgency. Always alone. Always paying well for his discretion.

The Case of the Opulent Overseer

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/21/2026		Page Views: 80
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Mariana #Sisapo #Mining #Murder #Mystery #RomanHispania #Hispania #Spain
Lucian and Demetrios are invited to dine at a house of secrets.
Estimated reading time: 11 minute(s) (2546 words)

The sun was climbing toward its zenith when Lucian and Demetrios rode into Mariana three days after the eclipse. Red cinnabar dust hung in the air like a curse, dyeing the roofs and cloaks and the rims of every eye. A miner coughed wetly as they passed—the wet, rattling sound of lungs filling with what they were not meant to hold. The livestock looked sickly. Even the dogs seemed afraid. Lucian had never seen a town that looked so much like it was choking on its own wealth.

Who Dun It?

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/23/2026		Page Views: 13
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Mariana #Sisapo #Hispania
Demetrios is arrested for the murder of the Overseer of Mines.
Estimated reading time: 12 minute(s) (2724 words)

Lucian was just dozing off when he was startled awake by a scream in the night. Moments later, Demetrios burst through the door of their bedchamber as if the door had wronged him personally. He crossed the room in three long strides, and began stuffing his second tunic into a satchel.

The Trial of Demetrios

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/24/2026		Page Views: 16
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Mariana #Sisapo #Hispania
Lucian defends Demetrios and unmasks the murderer.
Estimated reading time: 26 minute(s) (6061 words)

The trial sat in the forum at the second hour. The magistrate, Lucian gathered, had refused to convene under the basilica's leaking roof; he would not be seen judging a capital case beneath a drip. The tribunal had been set up in the open air instead, the curule chair on a low dais beside the speaker's platform, benches for the household witnesses arranged to one side. The crowd packed the open square.

I'll Be Home for Saturnalia

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/26/2026		Page Views: 17
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Corduba #Castulo #Saturnalia #AntoninePlague #Hispania #Spain #LucianofSamosata
Lucian receives devastating news from home.
Estimated reading time: 20 minute(s) (4541 words)

Castulo had been good to them. They had ridden into the silver city in the first week of November with the cinnabar of Mariana still under their fingernails, intending to stay perhaps four days and to push on for Corduba; they had stayed a fortnight, and then another, and would have stayed longer if the calendar had not begun to whisper at them that the Saturnalia was coming and that they were two hundred miles from anywhere they wished to spend it.

Rivers of Wine

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/27/2026		Page Views: 13
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Gades #Hispania #Spain
Lucian trades tall tales with a tavern full of sailors.
Estimated reading time: 17 minute(s) (3989 words)

They left Corduba a week after Saturnalia, on a wide-bottomed river barge that smelled of olive oil and tar and the wet wool of the bargeman's cloak. The Baetis ran slow at that season, brown and patient, and the barge ran with it. Lucian sat in the bow with his cloak wrapped tight and watched the bank slide past—mile after mile of winter orchard, of harvested vineyard, of villas shuttered against the cold, the smoke of farmhouse chimneys rising in thin columns into a sky that had lost its blue. He said very little.

Calpe Diem

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/28/2026		Page Views: 10
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Calpe #PillarsOfHeracles #Abila #Mauretania #Tingis #Hispania #Spain #LucianofSamosata
Lucian and Demetrios hike to the top of the Pillar of Heracles.
Estimated reading time: 19 minute(s) (4377 words)

The coaster left Gades at first light. Demetrios and Lucian stood with their two horses, patient and steaming in the cold air of the deck. By midday Mons Calpe filled the southeastern sky—closer than Lucian had imagined, bigger, more sheer; a great wedge of pale limestone rising straight out of the sea, as if the gods, having decided to mark the edge of the inner world, had wanted no one to mistake their mark for anything else.

Strangers On A Boat

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/29/2026		Page Views: 28
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Tingis #Tangier #Mauretania #Abila
Lucian and Demetrios meet the mystery man.
Estimated reading time: 18 minute(s) (4252 words)

For a moment nobody said anything. The wind filled the silence, and the deck rose and fell, and the man with the pale gray eyes stood waiting for an answer to a question that Lucian could not begin to make sense of.

Bad Water

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/30/2026		Page Views: 19
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Mauretania #LucianofSamosata
Lucian must find a way to stop a tribe from dying from a mysterious malady.
Estimated reading time: 20 minute(s) (4672 words)

Lucian's mind had rehearsed, in the long second between the woman's words and whatever came next, a number of deaths. He had read Herodotus. He knew what was done to captives in the wild places: the throats opened over altars, the slow tortures, the things the Nasamones were said to do that he had quoted at Demetrios not three hours before. He stood with his wrists bound and his heart going like a trapped bird and waited to discover which of his many readings was about to come true.

The Curse of the Monkey's Tomb

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 5/31/2026		Page Views: 19
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Carthage
A thieving monkey uncovers a truth Lucian can't outrun.
Estimated reading time: 13 minute(s) (2925 words)

Carthage announced itself long before they saw it: the smell of it, the noise of it, the particular quality of light that comes off a harbor where a thousand ships have convinced themselves they own the sea. The harbor was packed. Merchant vessels and grain ships and the occasional sleek Roman military corvette, all of them crammed into a space that seemed designed for half the number. Sailors shouted in a dozen languages. Dock workers moved cargo. Seagulls circled overhead. Street vendors hawked their wares.

The High Seas

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 6/1/2026		Page Views: 23
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Voyage #Alexandria #Hemp #Cannabis
Lucian and Demetrios discover cannabis.
Estimated reading time: 12 minute(s) (2626 words)

They left two days later, as Lucian, having resigned himself to continuing their eastward journey, found himself looking forward to seeing Alexandria for the first time. Ships left with the morning tide. Their ship would make two brief stops in Sicilia, and then toward Alexandria. The ship was not grand. It was functional, smelling of rope and salt and the practical business of moving cargo from one place to another.

Marian The Librarian

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 6/2/2026		Page Views: 28
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Alexandria #LibraryofAlexandria #Serapeum
Lucian faces his most demanding audience yet: scholars.
Estimated reading time: 8 minute(s) (1810 words)

The first order of business in Alexandria was practical: finding decent quarters and a stable for the horses. The second was asking for directions to the Library. This proved more complicated than expected.

Death and Taxes

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 6/3/2026		Page Views: 24
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Alexandria #Nile #Krocodilopolis
An investigation into grain theft leads to a crocodile's judgment.
Estimated reading time: 28 minute(s) (6478 words)

The morning after Lucian's performance at the Library, Celer knocked at the rental's door. His expression carried the weight of a man who'd discovered something that shouldn't have been possible.

Pirates of the Mediterranean

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 6/4/2026		Page Views: 23
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Pirates #Antioch #SeleuciaPieria #Hebrews
Lucian's ship is boarded by pirates!
Estimated reading time: 23 minute(s) (5271 words)

Lucian and Demetrios (with Veritas the monkey) left Alexandria on a hot morning in July, the white limestone of the Pharos shining above the harbor in the new sun and the gulls performing the small acrobatic loops they performed every day at sailing time. The ship was a Syrian merchantman called the Tyche, a fat-bellied grain hauler making the run home empty after delivering her cargo to the imperial granaries. Empty hulls ride high and roll badly, but they take passengers cheaply; and her captain, a Sidonian named Eshmunazar who declared (as often as he could work it into the conversation) that he had been making this crossing since he was eleven, kept the kind of disciplined ship that hopefully would not lose its horses overboard in a summer chop.

You Can't Go Home Again

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 6/5/2026		Page Views: 62
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Hierapolis #Atargatis #Zeugma #Samosata
Lucian returns to Samosata to find clues to the fate of his lost family.
Estimated reading time: 21 minute(s) (4975 words)

Lucian and Demetrios rode out of Antioch on a clear morning at the beginning of September, with the city's bath-smoke rising into a cool sky behind them and the dust of the eastern road already on their cloaks before they were out of the suburbs.

True Lies

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 6/6/2026		Page Views: 96
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Edessa #Plague
On the road to Edessa, Lucian is struck by the plague.
Estimated reading time: 15 minute(s) (3536 words)

Lucian woke at the second hour with his head heavier than it had been the night before, but with the headache itself no worse, which he chose to read as a sign that the bed had been at fault and the morning was going to be better. He drank two cups of water from the inn's jug, ate half a piece of bread that he didn't really want, told Demetrios he was fine, and went out to saddle the horse himself in the cool blue of the pre-dawn. The east was just beginning to gray over the line of hills they had been riding toward yesterday.

We'll Always Have Edessa

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 6/7/2026		Page Views: 21
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Edessa #Tabitha #Demetrios #Athens #Recovery #AntoninePlague
Lucian recovers, reunites with his sister, and turns toward the next stage of his life.
Estimated reading time: 13 minute(s) (3038 words)

Lucian recovered, after that, in the slow honest way a man recovers from a disease that nearly kills him—a week of weakness, a week of returning interest in food, a week of short angry walks around the small inner courtyard of the hospital under his sister's supervision and her commentary on the pace of his progress, which she considered insufficient. By the end of the third week he could read for an hour without his eyes blurring, eat what he was given without negotiation, and sit upright on the stone bench in the courtyard talking with Demetrios for a full afternoon without falling asleep against his shoulder. Tabitha pronounced him no longer in danger of dying and merely in danger of being an idiot, which was, she said, his baseline medical condition.

A Chronology of Lucian's World

By: Paul S. Cilwa	Posted: 6/7/2026		Page Views: 23
Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #Timeline #Chronology #RomanEmpire #MarcusAurelius #ParthianWar #AntoninePlague
A timeline of Lucian's life amidst the historical events of the 2nd century Roman Empire.
Estimated reading time: 7 minute(s) (1613 words)

The events of this novel take place in the 2nd century of the common era, largely under the reigns of Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius. Lucian of Samosata was a real person—a Greek-speaking Syrian rhetor, satirist, and the author of the earliest known work of science fiction. The chronology below sets the events of his life (as I have imagined them, sticking where I can to what the historical record will support) against the events of the Roman world in which he lived. Years marked with an asterisk are dates established by the novel; the rest are matters of history. Readers in a hurry may skip this page. Readers who like the small satisfactions of working out what was happening when may find it useful.