• Age: 12 to 17
• Grade: 7 to 12

Fourteen-year-old Bec learned a lesson that day. Be careful whom you rob.

A slave on the run from his vicious master, Bec is desperate for money. But when he mugs Tien Nu, he gets more than he bargained for. Tien Nu isn't just a superb acrobat and kung fu wizard. He's also killed his father - or so he thinks. As the paths of the two boys become intertwined with the journey of a mysterious knight, mayhem ensues when they head cross-country toward the safety of Ponti, with Bec's slave master in hot pursuit.

A medieval, historical adventure in the Kingdom of Italia

Brian Slattery is a law professor at Osgoode Hall Law School, York University. He is an experienced traveller, currently completing a hike from Canterbury to Rome, and well versed in the martial arts. This is his debut novel. He lives in Toronto, Ontario.

Brian Slattery's profile page

Antonio Javier Caparo is a Cuban born award-winning illustrator living in Montreal. His works have been selected for publication in the prestigious Spectrum Fantastic Art Annual, and his previous clients include National Geographic, Disney, HarperCollins, Simon & Schuster, and Penguin Random House. His illustrations are made with a mix of graphite pencils on Strathmore paper, and digitally using Procreate and Photoshop.

Antonio Javier Caparo's profile page

"Escape to Ponti is a rich, classically-influenced, well-researched, and multi-layered novel that never ceases to draw the reader in with its adventurous plots and intriguing studies in character. Every person in the story—the boys, the Knight, castle lords, peasants, bandits, and servants—are richly portrayed as both complex and archetypical, none completely good nor evil… An enjoyable, well-written, complex and timeless novel.
Highly Recommended"