In the interest of full disclosure, I know the author of this novella personally, although I did not realize that when I first read it. Lūdī Scaenicī is a Latin novel that is designed to help students of Latin build vocabulary and practice reading fluency. The language is simple and targets basic case usage. Students in the latter half of their first year of Latin (or halfway through their first college semester of Latin) should be able to read it fairly easily. It is also impressively content- rich. Roman Comedy scholar Christopher Bungard introduces a wealth of information in his short simple sentences about the practical aspects of Roman theater. Short chapters are devoted to topics like ancient playwrights, actors, characters, Gods of theater, and theater festivals. Thanks to the close connection between theater and religion, readers learn a lot of important religious vocabulary that will crop up later in the work of ancient authors. The 80-page novella also includes many images drawn from Roman art and archaeology and even modern productions in ancient theater that highlight targeted vocabulary and supplement the simple text. This book is the first in Bolchazy-Carducci’s Explore Latin series. The full series will have four Latin novels, each increasing in difficulty, and I look forward to later volumes. – Krishni Burns