In one sentence, The Sarantine Mosaic is the story of a group of competent and clever people, masters of their professions (be it mosaicist, doctor, emperor, cook or soldier) working against and with each other, and against the larger forces of the world, trying to break free of the shackles of their past and their cultures to leave their mark on the world, to make a difference, to ensure that their life and deeds would be remembered. Underneath the fantasy trappings, this is a powerful but ubiquitous story which has been played out ad infinitum in the past and will continue to do so in the future. What happens when a talented person is at the peak of his/her abilities and has conquered everyone else, but knows that time is the only enemy that will ever remain elusive, due to mortal lifespan of humans and history's tendency to distort and mangle events of the past?

While this is the main theme, the author also successfully explores other ideas related to religion and history. The prose is beautiful as expected, and all the characters are incredibly nuanced (some of them a little bit too much to be honest). One female character in particular is introduced in the beginning as an antagonist, and in spite of not changing or doing anything good throughout the story, and in fact causing many deaths, still becomes an incredibly conflicted and empathetic character towards the end, and is involved in a particularly heart-breaking scene in the climax.

The story does feels a bit bloated at times, and particularly the entire episode involving the zubir in Sailing to Sarantium feels disconnected from the main plot and could easily have been removed or shortened. It also feels a bit unreal how every beautiful female character throws herself to our protagonist mosaicist, but then that is also true about certain other characters. As usual, the casual violence can be a bit disturbing, and I do think that the author goes a bit overboard with all the sexual tension, and how it seems to perpetuate through almost every important event, but this really is nitpicking. The Sarantine mosaic is a beautiful, powerful story which in spite of its fantasy trappings and its larger-than-life characters will resonate with many readers.