What do you think?
Rate this book
Elissa: Dux Femina Facti
Elissa, or Dido as the Romans called her, is famous for her “love” story with the Roman hero, Aeneas. But, she has a story all her own to tell. In this novella, she recounts her great love for Sychaeus, her journey from Tyre, and her pursuit of a better future for herself and her people in Africa. Fēmina dux factī erat. This novella is aimed at novice-level readers. It contains only 109 words, excluding proper nouns.
56 pages, Paperback
Published September 15, 2020
11 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
March 23, 2023
Repetition Swallows the Reader Despite a Good Base Premise
This book is like comfort food that tastes the exact same each time, but at its core you still enjoy it. Our female protagonist finds herself at odds with the world as she, loving only her adoring Sychaeus, must fend off her brother, a possible one sided lover, and an overall oppressive world. The base concept was quite investing, but as time went on I found it continuously repetitive as lines of story were found to repeat themselves over and over. Still, the story was enjoyable overall.
As a member of Latin III I found the structure of this book's narrative terribly dull due to an unrelenting repetition of the same lines again and again. By the end of it you will surely be sick of hearing how Elissa loves only Sychaeus and Sychaeus only her. Still, hints of complex grammar persist throughout with the occasional indirect statement but vocabulary and grammatical construction find themselves taking a backseat. If you read at a lower level this book will be fine, but higher levels may be slightly bored. Despite all this, the book did at points have a flow where I was invested and reading at a continuous, quick pace.
This book is like comfort food that tastes the exact same each time, but at its core you still enjoy it. Our female protagonist finds herself at odds with the world as she, loving only her adoring Sychaeus, must fend off her brother, a possible one sided lover, and an overall oppressive world. The base concept was quite investing, but as time went on I found it continuously repetitive as lines of story were found to repeat themselves over and over. Still, the story was enjoyable overall.
As a member of Latin III I found the structure of this book's narrative terribly dull due to an unrelenting repetition of the same lines again and again. By the end of it you will surely be sick of hearing how Elissa loves only Sychaeus and Sychaeus only her. Still, hints of complex grammar persist throughout with the occasional indirect statement but vocabulary and grammatical construction find themselves taking a backseat. If you read at a lower level this book will be fine, but higher levels may be slightly bored. Despite all this, the book did at points have a flow where I was invested and reading at a continuous, quick pace.
February 24, 2023
A Easy Beginner Book With A Repetitive Story Line
This book was about a girl who really wanted to be queen and had a estranged relationship with her father. The book is slightly confusing with all of the relationships she has. Her relationship with her brother is really interesting because as brother and sister you would expect them to be close but they are not. Greed is also a major aspect of this book and causes for some plot twists. It is quite boring because similar story lines keep repeating
The Latin in this book is repetitive. The vocab is all really easy and if you don't understand it, there is all the vocab in the back of the book. The sentence structure is also very repetitive and quite easy to get the hang of. There are no complex grammar constructions and it is generally easy to understand after you have the grammar and vocab retained in your memory.
This book was about a girl who really wanted to be queen and had a estranged relationship with her father. The book is slightly confusing with all of the relationships she has. Her relationship with her brother is really interesting because as brother and sister you would expect them to be close but they are not. Greed is also a major aspect of this book and causes for some plot twists. It is quite boring because similar story lines keep repeating
The Latin in this book is repetitive. The vocab is all really easy and if you don't understand it, there is all the vocab in the back of the book. The sentence structure is also very repetitive and quite easy to get the hang of. There are no complex grammar constructions and it is generally easy to understand after you have the grammar and vocab retained in your memory.
March 15, 2023
The story was interesting, and it's based on a real story so it is even more interesting. I liked the independent strong female lead character and how she ran away to build her own successful nation.
The language was too easy which made it a little bit repetitive and boring. I am in Latin I but I found that the repeating sentences did not help me remember the words but distracted me from new plot twists being introduced to the book. Overall, for beginners, this book is good as it intrudces a lot of vocabulary and grammar-but it is a slow read.
The language was too easy which made it a little bit repetitive and boring. I am in Latin I but I found that the repeating sentences did not help me remember the words but distracted me from new plot twists being introduced to the book. Overall, for beginners, this book is good as it intrudces a lot of vocabulary and grammar-but it is a slow read.
January 20, 2021
As a novice-level Latin novella, this does the job, mostly well: it has a simple story, with lots of repetition of vocabulary and structure, to help the novice reader acquire and understand the language in real time. But, the story would have benefited from another read-through for typos, to clarify the plot in parts, and for grammatical infelicities.
Overall, I disliked the changes made to Dido's/Elissa's story and the weakening of their characters.
Overall, I disliked the changes made to Dido's/Elissa's story and the weakening of their characters.
March 28, 2023
The book is from Elissa's point of view about her life. The first chapter is background on her family, which mainly goes into her love for Sycheus. The setting is in Africa, and there is a decent description of what it was like to live there during this period. I started to enjoy the story when Elissa went to the underworld and fell in love with Aeneas.
For the actual grammar, vocab, and flow of the story, it was easy because there was not too many words that came up out of nowhere. Each chapter was pretty repetitive with words and gave a lot of description to understand the story more.
For the actual grammar, vocab, and flow of the story, it was easy because there was not too many words that came up out of nowhere. Each chapter was pretty repetitive with words and gave a lot of description to understand the story more.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews