The Witch's Knight - SOON TO BE RELEASED!! - by Paula and Trevor Brackston

 

ARC Review - Scheduled Release Date - April 19, 2022

The Witch's Knight by Paula and Trevor Brackston

“I, Rhiannon, pledge you my allegiance, my dagger hand, my magic, and my life.

You have my oath.”

Do you enjoy stories about witches and knights in armor? You should read this book. Medieval historical fiction? You should read this book. Eternal love? Read this book. Modern suspense thriller? Yep. This book.

The Witch’s Knight, by Paula Brackston and her brother, Trevor, is an exhilarating departure from Paula’s wildly successful Witch’s and Found Things series. This collaborative work adds a thrilling new dimension which Paula’s already dedicated readers will love. (I certainly did!) Trevor’s voice adds a rumbling bass line of suspense and danger in counterpoint to Paula’s soaring sopranos of magic and romance. Dare I say this work is “magical?”

When Gwen’s home in The Black Mountains of Wales is attacked by vicious Norman baron, De Chapelle, in 1094, following William the Conqueror’s invasion of England, she confronts the baron, defending her family and village from further depredation. No match for the villainous Norman, Gwen picks a battle she cannot hope to win. He turns her own knife against her and leaves her for dead.

The few survivors of the attack desperately retreat to a small farming croft high in the mountains and carve out a meager and isolated, yet peaceful, existence. Gwen is nursed back to health and the tiny community – widows, wounded soldiers from her father’s court, orphans – becomes a family. The village grandmother, Mamgi, tutors Gwen in the art of witchcraft, encouraging her to use her abilities to protect the settlement. Gwen protects their crops and livestock from the worst of the weather and lends her skills to healing the sick.

After surviving their first winter tucked away in the Black Valley, the displaced villagers choose a small party to travel to a nearby town for much needed supplies and news. Gwen, now known as Lady Rhiannon, and two of the men track carefully into town, intent on making their trades and leaving as quickly as possible. That plan goes awry when Gwen is recognized by one of de Chappelle’s men. A traveling knight comes to her rescue and is wounded in the melee. One of the men is taken captive while the other narrowly escapes with the supply wagon.

Gwen’s savior is Tudor. While he heals, and as he is slowly accepted by the wary villagers, the two become inseparable. When de Chappelle eventually finds them, Tudor is mortally wounded in defense of the village and Gwen pleads with ancient powers to spare his life. Thus sparking a love which will transcend the limits of time and span centuries.

 

“Tudor watched her go, wondering at the way the world had a habit of spinning like a roulette wheel, snatching you onto familiar numbers at the most unexpected of times.”

 

In modern day London, Rhys Tudor is an ex-military private security contractor responsible for the safety of a nineteen year-old rich kid. When his employers purchase a posh flat in The Aurora, an extremely exclusive building, for their son, Tudor is diligent about protecting his charge. Not long after moving his ward into his new digs, a series of grisly murders take place, annihilating two entire families in the building. Suddenly, Tudor and his daughter, Emily are swept up in a terrifying whirlwind of Slavic gangsters, fighting off assailants and dodging bullets. Despite his connections with the Metropolitan Police, Tudor is unsuccessful at ferreting out the reason why he or his daughter would be targets for the mafia-like Begovich family. His quest for clues and the safety of his daughter, leads him to strange and unusual ends where coincidences and happenings are unnerving, even for a hardened soldier like Tudor.

Told as two seemingly separate stories, through two seemingly unrelated timelines, The Witch’s Knight weaves together disparate characters and incongruous eras in a beautiful dance to the final page when the two worlds eventually, finally, collide. The Brackstons hurtle their readers through time and space, never letting up on the throttle, until the last gasp, quite literally the last four paragraphs of the book. My only complaint with this work is purely selfish. I need Book Two (and Three!) to be ready for consumption. I need to know more!

Totally Traditional This Round - Sorry If I Let You Down

 

Alas dear readers, I have no Indie Authors to review for you this month. And to be quite honest, I feel a bit fraudulent and shamefaced because of it and wondered if you would find me to be isingenuous for even writing this month's "What I'm Reading" section. Nevertheless, I did quite a bit of reading this month and wanted to share my thoughts on the books which occupied much of my free time.

I discovered Angela Duckworth's, Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance, after watching her TEDtalk for a class assignment. I purchased the Kindle version, realized I was underlining on nearly every page, and promptly ordered a paperback copy for ease of flip-through reference. I even recommended the book to my husband, who is not known for his love of reading. Her insight into the influence of 'grit' on success is fascinating. She effectively and engagingly explains why sometimes lackluster students go on to surprising professional triumphs while students who breeze through school sometimes struggle to find their place in a world which was once their oyster. She offers advice for how to instill 'grittiness' in our children as well as how to be more 'gritty' ourselves. We often tell others to never give up. Grit exposes the characteristics of those who couldn't give up if they wanted to and how we can cultivate those same characteristics to develop our own passions. 

Melanie Karsak dives deep into the legend of Celtic Queen Boudica in her book, Queen of Oak. If you enjoy tales of old magic, druids, priestesses, faeries, family, love, and loss, you're sure to enjoy the quick paced twists and turns as Boudica and her family strive to protect their kingdom from greedy neighbors and worry over rumors of another Roman invasion. Karsak creates a world grounded in reality with a healthy infusion of fantasy as only the ancients could have imagined it. This is no fly by night, read in one sitting tale. At 598 pages, readers are thoroughly immersed in the Celtic Iceni holdings of Britain, now known as Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambridge and Essex, during the first century AD. History is somewhat sparse for this period, so why not turn our imaginations to what might have been. Fair warning, Queen of Oak is the first in a series and the second isn't due out until March of 2022. If you enjoy it as much as I did, you'll be left dangling by a breathless thread until then.  
 
When two of your FAVORITE authors drop much anticipated, pre-ordered books on the SAME DAY, you are left shaking your fists at the Gods of Publishing and gnashing your teeth in indecision about which to read first. This was the dilemma I faced when Paula Brackston's City of Time and Magic dropped on the same day as Diana Gabaldon's Go Tell the Bees That I Am Gone. I won't reveal which I read first because it is enough to say that I've now read them both and am happy to pass along my thoughts to you.

In City of Time and Magic, Brackston masterfully manages a lovely bit of crossover between her two very popular book series, Witches and Found Things. When the previous book in the Found Things series, The Garden of Promises and Lies, ended with a heart wrenching, gut punching cliffhanger, I was eager to rejoin Xanthe in her quest to find and rescue her lover, Liam, from her erstwhile Spinning mentor, Lydia Flyte. Although she is understandably nervous about the potential consequences, she decides she may need some 'muscle' on this trip through time and agrees to allow the lovable bear of a barman, Harley, to accompany her on her mission. Brackston graciously spared us from heartache this go around but not from wanting more of Xanthe's time-traveling adventures. I am looking forward to traveling with her. All I can do is hope the Gods of Publishing are more benevolent next time. Oh! And don't worry, if you haven't read the Witches books, you won't be lost or puzzled by the crossover. Brackston's story weaving skills are impeccable. Familiar readers will recognize old friends, new readers will simply make new ones. 

Oh Diana Gabaldon, for some reason, I was under the impression that Go Tell the Bees That I Am Gone was going to be the last installment in your addictive Outlander series. When I saw the page count, I thought "Nope. No way she wraps this up in such a short work." Don't laugh. This series routinely tops 1000 pages per installment so I knew 960 pages would never be enough. Indeed, Gabaldon has been doling out massive doses of Jamie Fraser and Claire Randall for thirty years and quite frankly, I will be bereft when she does finish their story. In Bees, Jamie and Claire rebuild their home, welcome Brianna and Roger back to the ridge, argue with tenants as the Revolution creeps further and further south, and of course, make lots of love along the way. I won't spoil the story but I will tell you I was thrilled and breathless when I read the last pages as I realized there absolutely MUST be another book in the offing. Gabaldon works a cliffhanger as deftly as a potter spins clay.

In tribute to my end of year reflections, I thought it would be nice to revisit the book which forever and irrevocably hooked me, heart and imagination, on Historical Fiction. Sharon Kay Penman's, When Christ and His Saints Slept, illuminates the story of Matilda (also known as Maude), Empress of Germany and granddaughter of William the Conqueror, who is forced into a loveless, violent, political marriage to the much younger Count of Anjou, Geoffrey, after her first husband's death. When her father, Henry I, names her as his heir, the English Lords are unsettled. At his death, they swear he made a deathbed proclamation identifying his nephew, Stephen of Blois, as his heir instead. Maude feels robbed and, with her husband, launches a decades long war to reclaim her stolen crown. With more twists and turns than even the best pure fiction novel can provide, Penman's thorough research and recounting of historical events proves the adage, "truth is sometimes stranger than fiction." This epic tale, the first in Penman's Plantagenet series, is spellbinding - every time I dip into its pages. I am in perpetual upside-down debt to Penman for the gift she unknowingly gave me when I stumbled on this book nearly 26 years ago.