Immortal

Immortal
Traci L. Slatton
Bantam Dell
ISBN: 978-0-385-33974-2
Fiction, Historical Fantasy
Reviewed by Kevin Joseph

Traci Slatton’s first novel, Immortal, is an impressive piece of historical fiction, with an intriguing fantastical bent. Growing up as an orphan on the streets of fourteenth-century Florence, Luca Bastardo realizes that he’s different from ordinary boys. Blessed with extraordinary physical perfection, startling regenerative abilities, and a glacially-slow biological clock, Luca struggles in vain to track down information about his lost parents and a lineage that seems to be linked to the mysterious Cathars.
Betrayed by a friend, Luca is sold to a cruel brothel owner, forcing him to endure years of abuse and degradation. Only when Florence is decimated by the Black Death, decades later, does Luca manage to escape his bondage and turn his fortunes around. Luca’s enjoyment of his newfound wealth and comfortable lifestyle is tempered, however, by a vivid prophesy in which he’s forced to choose between immortality and the true love of a woman. As he cultivates friendships and alliances with various Renaissance figures like Leonardo da Vinci and the Medicis, seeks to master the secrets of alchemy, and searches for his soul mate, Luca’s agelessness attracts the attention of sadistic persecutors at a time when the Renaissance is giving way to the Inquisition.
As one might expect in an epic spanning nearly two centuries that’s brimming with authentic historical detail, Immortal has a density and pacing that requires patience and perseverance on the reader’s part. The writing, while somewhat workmanlike, melodramatic, and overly-reliant on dialogue tags and explanation points to convey emotion, is precise and well-edited. I’m eager to see what this talented author will be able to accomplish once she sheds some of these conventional constraints and unleashes her full artistic talent.