Mare nostrum: reading level, length and free edition

Name: Mare nostrum
Author: Vicente Blasco Ibáñez

Mare nostrum by Vicente Blasco Ibáñez is a novel in Spanish. Our team rates it B2. It runs to 144,898 words with 17,514 different word forms, about 12–24 h of reading at 200 to 100 words per minute, and it is free from Project Gutenberg.

By the Readlang Mobile team (an independent app, not affiliated with readlang.com). Updated 31 October 2026.

Author: Vicente Blasco Ibáñez
Language: Spanish
Level: B2
Form: novel
Words: 144,898
Different word forms: 17,514
Forms for 95% / 98%: 10,270 / 14,617
Reading time: 12–24 h
Free edition: Project Gutenberg

Aventura marítima y espionaje durante la Primera Guerra Mundial en el Mediterráneo.

Is Mare nostrum right for your level?

To recognise 95% of the running words in Mare nostrum, you need its 10,270 most frequent word forms; for 98%, the share at which most readers manage a novel without a dictionary, 14,617. The median Spanish B2 book in our table needs 7,656 forms for 95%, so by this measure the book is harder than most for its level: number 8 of 10, easiest first.

A word form is any spelling that appears in the text, so “walk” and “walked” count twice, and names count too. These numbers are a guide to how much vocabulary the book asks for, not a test. The level itself was set by hand by our team. Before you commit, read one page of the free edition and count the words you do not know: the one-page test takes two minutes.

Which words should you know before you start?

These are the words that Mare nostrum uses most often but that are not among the 2,000 most common word forms across all 36 Spanish books in our library; the number is how many times each appears. Names of people and places are left out. Learning a handful of them first makes the opening chapters easier.

doctora 110
buques 85
nostrum 83
vapor 78
hotel 63
olas 57
golfo 53
proa 53
marina 51
viajes 50
piloto 48
puertos 45
superficie 44
popa 44
costas 43

How does it begin?

El tenía diez años y la emperatriz seiscientos. Su padre, don Esteban Ferragut—tercera cuota del Colegio de Notarios de Valencia—, admiraba las cosas del pasado.

From the Project Gutenberg edition, which is in the public domain. If this paragraph already feels slow, try a book one level lower.

How long does it take to read?

Hours to read *Mare nostrum* (144,898 words) at four reading speeds.
Words	100 wpm	150 wpm	200 wpm	250 wpm
144,898	24 h	16 h	12 h	9.5 h

Learners reading a book at their level often manage 100 to 150 words per minute, and readers in their first language 200 to 250. Where these speeds come from, and a calculator for your own: How long does it take to read a book?

Where can you read it for free?

The free edition is Project Gutenberg eBook #23236. Project Gutenberg publishes books that are in the public domain in the United States, as EPUB, Kindle and plain text, free and without an account. Copyright terms differ by country: if you live outside the United States, check that the book is out of copyright where you are before you download it.

To read it with a translation over every word you tap, open it in Readlang Mobile on iPhone or iPad.