A Son of Mars, volume 1

In the cramped, noisy world of a 19th‑century army barracks, Sergeant Jonadab Larkins runs a household that feels more like a circus than a home. His many children treat the stone walls and drawbridge chains as playgrounds, daring each other to dart across traffic and scale perilous ledges. Life is a constant blend of strict discipline and reckless freedom, all under the watchful eye of a weary wife who barely finds time to breathe between chores.

When a sudden accident claims one of the boys, the already fragile routine shatters. A gaunt, silver‑haired lady arrives, frantic and oddly insistent that the child be hers, offering to buy him and demanding his removal from the barracks. Her mysterious motives and the sergeant’s uneasy honesty about the child’s parentage set the stage for a clash of duty, pride, and survival that will test the fragile bonds of this makeshift family.