The Pict was a fun, quick read. It's page turning historical fiction about a people group that we know little about, and though I wouldn't say I know a lot more about the Picts now, I enjoyed this sketch a great deal. ( )

This book tells the story of the Pictish warrior Calach and his struggles, military as well as personal, with the Roman Empire. As we know next to nothing about the people we call the Picts, this has to be placed somewhere in the realm between fantasy and an educated guess. However, it's a good and plausible story, as well as an enjoyable read, albeit at just under 200 pages a rather quick one. ( )

I was glad to find another novel on Roman Britain from the natives' point of view. This novel tells of Calach [Galgacus, as the Romans call him] from his boyhood in which he first comes into contact with evil; is accused of something he did not commit and acquitted; through his personal tragedies and years leading a federation of Pictish tribes offering stiff resistance to the Roman menace. The brutal Romans [and I admit that they were, although I am a lover of Roman fiction,] under Governor [and General] Agricola, first destroy a Selgovae village then build a series of forts to the north. Then the united Picts defeat the Romans through several guerrilla actions. At Mons Graupius Agricola is not able to conquer the land and to subdue this courageous people. The author paraphrases Calath's morale-boosting words to his troops and his strong words to Agricola, both from Tacitus originally. As Calath boldly says to Agricola in their face-to-face meeting: since you Romans have to write everything down, "you are slaves to your posterity". The Romans finally depart and leave these brave people in peace.

I really can't comment on the Gaelic names, except Suemas should have been Seumas. The XXth Legion wasn't headquartered at Viroconium as the novel would lead a reader to believe; however, there was a garrison there. The author should have made that clear. I wondered if some of the smaller tribes' names were really accurate. The strong points of the novel was not the writing style--quite ordinary--but the story itself and empathy I felt for the Picts. I liked the author's explanation of the Picts' appearance: the blue color mixed with ash. The author's narration of their origin and migration from Scythia to Ireland to their final homeland in the highlands of northern Scotland was probably just as valid as anyone else's; all we can do is speculate. The author created a convincing persona for Calach. ( )

My final read in 2012 was The Pict by Jack Dixon. I was really looking forward to this one because it touched very close to my heart. I am a Scot, and I can trace my line back to a merger with the Picts, though nothing as stellar as anything claimed by the MacAlpins. That said, this was an important read to me. I did absolutely no research on the author before I dug into the book, so whatever he may have said about his work here or what he felt he did with it, I have my own feelings about how it came across to an average Scottish reader.

Most history books take the Roman writings regarding the attempts to Romanise all of Britannia at their face value. These writings portray Calach, the protagonist of Jack Dixon’s novel, as a savage figure who, at the battle of Mons Graupius, succumbed to the might of the Roman military machine. He did not. In fact, most of Scotland today tends to forget that Calach and his semblance of the then 20 tribes of Pictland even happened, but it did. It was through him that Scotland had its first tenuous grip on what it means to be a nation. They united themselves and did something very few can claim to have done. They badgered and annoyed the Romans all the way back to the south to England, and never allowed them to conquer what was known at the time as Pictland, later Scotland.

I truly enjoyed this story of Scotland’s first recorded hero from beginning to end, with a small stumble over the use of names. Once I got past this, though, it was a remarkable read. I have been searching for a work of fiction that touched on this period of time in Pictish history, because it was surely the Picts who drove the Romans back from Scotland. I had imagined it had been done almost exactly in the way Jack framed the incursions. Walking the area again in my head as he described the terrain brought back some stellar memories. I was also pleased to see him describe both the tattoos and their blue skin the way that he did. They weren’t “painted” blue at all. The skin was dyed a hue that made them appear blue. I have argued this point for years.

My one criticism of this entire work is in the use of Scottish Gaelic names, particularly in the first few chapters. Please, if you are going to use them, use them correctly. It is Seumas, not Suemas. Liusaidh has an accent: Liùsaidh, which I know the author can accomplish in the manuscript easily enough. If I know the keyboard shortcuts, surely the author knows them, as well. If any of this had been a singular occurrence, I wouldn’t even mention it, but it was consistent throughout the story.

Jack, my hat’s off to you for writing a rich story about an underrated period of time when tribes of barbarians were put down by the Romans, and when it was clear that it would take someone with foresight and courage to pull together a fragmented people to drive them back.

I recommend this book especially to other Scots like me looking for something tangible to help them understand a truly unrecorded history of the anthropology of a race of people who inhabited our Scotland. ( )

I really enjoyed this book about a relatively unknown ancient people. Early Scots warriors. A struggle for survival against the mighty Roman empire.
Calach battles with his conscious and his grief for his dead wife.
It has enough historical fact to keep it real and enough battle to keep it interesting. ( )