"the People of The Sea"

Classical archaeology—the excavation and analysis of ancient Greek and Roman sites—was born on Wednesday, October 22, 1738. On that day, Roque Joaquín Alcubierre, an engineer in the army of the Bourbon royal family in Naples, was lowered by ropes down a square well shaft cut through volcanic material that had formed on the slopes of Mount Vesuvius.

Stealing into forbidden territory, sixteen-year-old Cyrus LongBones discovers that his small island is in fact a giant, fossilized turtle shell. With his village’s obsession of working the earth, the skeleton collapses in on itself, killing Cyrus’ brother and destroying his village.