Historical Fiction

The latest in the Medieval Murderers stories, this book is just as good as the others. Written through time by historical mystery authors Bernard Knight (Crowner John series); Ian Morson (William Falconer series); Michael Jecks (Templar series); Philip Gooden (Nick Revill series); and Susannah Gregory (Matthew Bartholomew series). Each author takes a turn relating events, inserting their particular character and time period into the story. This one begins in 1191 at Glastonbury Abbey where the remains of King Arthur are believed to have been discovered and end in 2004 where an interesting discovery is made during an archeological dig near the Tower Bridge. Great story! ( )

Shared world of mysteries centered on British legends of King Arthur's bones. Each section follows the bones to a different era, though most are medieval, and the dangers encountered by those protecting them. Someone manages to get murdered in each setting, of course, with a surprise twist at the end. ( )

These are just great fun reads. A series of short stories set at different historical periods that are linked by an object. In this case, the object are the Bones of King Arthur, which get dug up at Glastonbury Abbey, smuggled to Wales, dug up, moved, reburied, rediscovered, dug up, cause trouble and finally carried back to Wales. I like the way that the stories link to each other. So in this case there is a family of guardians of the bones, and the family name crops up in each story, with different degrees of involvement.
I particularly like the pairing of Simon & Gwenillan, the Norman lord & welsh lady who rely on her brains & his brawn. Nice portrait of a marriage, each bringing their own skills to life and the case at hand.
In a similar line there's Joe & Doll, in early 19th century London. they have a romantic element that adds a little extra angle to that element of the story as well.
the epilogue also leaves one with a satisfied glow.
A nice way to package a set of short stories, by having a common thread. ( )

WARNING: This review contains spoilers.

****

If one can say that half-star reviews have a "round up" or "round down" slant, I would say this is a "round up" 2.5 stars, because I liked the book well enough and am sufficiently tempted to check out other books in the series. That being said, this book was not without its flaws, as shall be discussed below.

The premise is rather interesting to an Arthur buff like myself: a series of five interlinked mysteries focusing on the bones of King Arthur and the various calamities that befall those who attempt to steal them, or even those who hide his bones in preparation for that mythical uprising when he will return to aid his country in their hour of greatest need. Anyway, I figured the best way to approach these interlinked mysteries was to let the plot serve as my primary entertainment, in case the multiple voices proved distracting. This was at the outset, when I was not aware that the mysteries, while sharing characters at some points and of course Arthur's bones, do stand up as individual works, so it's not like they're supposed to be a seamless blend.

The first act was probably the best, considering it was the most directly relevant to Arthur's bones (that's when they were first discovered, at Glastonbury Abbey). I enjoyed the scene where the Abbey's scholar dug out all of these Arthurian references, such as Gildas and William of Malmesbury. I read excerpts from those fellas in a King Arthur class I took in university, so that brought back some happy memories. The writing was okay, although I raised an eyebrow at the part where the buzz of the crowd surrounding the excavation where the bones were found was compared to the sound of bees -- I don't think there were too many other buzzing things in the 1100s. It's not like the Benedictine monks had chainsaws or leaf blowers or other gadgets that buzz. But that's just me quibbling.

Act 2 was all right, certainly full of family intrigue and strong-willed female characters (always a plus in fiction set in this time period). At one point somewhere around here I became confused because two men died and they had the same first name but were several decades apart.

I think Act 3 was probably the weakest. I've tried a book by this author before and it was completely forgettable, so I am not surprised that it was my least favourite. It had its moments, but the dating system used for the section headings struck me as kind of pretentious because nobody else did it. Also he had to footnote it with the date in our standard format, so what was the point exactly? It didn't really help establish atmosphere; on the contrary, it was a distraction. And the author here had a habit of explaining things twice, like he'd introduce a character on page 1 and say "Mr. So and So was an undertaker, the best in London" and then perhaps 10 pages later or whenever the character next appeared he would say "Mr. So and So was the best undertaker in London." My theory is that the author nods off while he's writing, then wakes up and can't remember where he is in the story, so he sticks in the explanation again. I think better editing would help eliminate such repetition.

Act 4 was okay character-wise, because it involved Shakespeare, who is great, and of course anything involving the animals in the Tower is bound to have some fun. But I found that one had the least amount of relevance to the Arthur's bones story. It seemed to be more like "Hey, here's Shakespeare and King Arthur's bones in the same story! That's cool enough, right?" I did like the idea of WS writing a play about Arthur (but then abandoning it because of his brush with the bones), but other than that the story was merely okay.

Act 5, set in the early 1800s, started out a bit slow but turned out slightly more interesting by the end, once again helped by a strong-willed female character (the part where she grabs the body-snatcher's privates and refuses to let go until he's given them what they need to know was somewhat amusing, and certainly that part was very descriptive).

And the epilogue... fell kind of flat. Also the part where the Welsh archaeologist is taking the bones back to her lab (and it's revealed she's a descendant of the Guardians who have been trying to keep the bones safe lo these many centuries) and then King Arthur and his men are sleeping in a cave nearby, then Arthur smiles and goes back to sleep, nearly made me yell "OH COME ON." Not that I am opposed to the thought of Arthur sleeping in a cave, but it felt kind of silly when she supposedly has a good portion of his bones in a box in her car.

In short, this is supposed to be a light read, so don't treat it any more seriously than you have to. If you like Arthur, if you like any of these authors, you'll probably enjoy this book. ( )