Love, Artifacts, and You by Sarah Ready

A note from the author

Dear Reader,

In years past I dug up fossils, traveled to out of the way archeological sites, crawled into barrows, descended into a jungle-hidden watery cave that in centuries past was known as the mouth of the underworld, and explored ancient ruins. My love of digging up the past landed me a laboratory job and lots of adventures.

Both the cenote and the Heart of the Empress are fictional, but they are based on my experience traveling on horseback deep into the jungle, far beyond roads and civilization. Likewise, the Viking Settlement in Romeo is fictional (as Romeo is a fictional town), but based on modern findings of Viking settlements in Canada.

The poem in Sol’s Cavern is based on a compilation of actual Runic Inscriptions from Bergen, Norway circa AD 1150-1350. You can find a translation of the runic inscriptions online. It’s also true that graffiti was a favorite pastime of bored Vikings, as well as other people groups of the past. The sampling of historical graffiti shows that humans have always been funny, proud, lovesick, or crude. Take your pick!

I hope you enjoyed Emma and Andrew’s adventure. I’m so glad I could bring them to Romeo. And thanks for sticking with me while I fudged archeology/history a bit for some fictional fun.

Thank you for reading!

All the best,

Sarah Ready