Pompeii

"Frank Santoro's graphic novel takes place just before the eruption of Pompeii in the year 79 CE. Marcus, a young expat artist from Paestum, works as an assistant in Pompeii to Flavius, a seemingly well-regarded painter. Aside from mixing paint, Marcus is entangled in the older artist's romantic deceptions, while stuck figuring out his own. Santoro has constructed a historical fiction that is rooted in emotional truths and structured around classical principles of composition."