August 3, 2001
Set during the misty Middle Ages, when brave knights in shining armor rescued fair maidens and chivalry and honor were prized above all things, this quartet of novellas from some of the genre's best-known writers takes the concept of the vow and spins it into four very different yet thematically linked medieval tales. Kurland leads off with "The Traveller," a humorous time travel piece that tosses a modern-day woman back into the life of a 13th-century knight who needs to reclaim his inheritance. Patricia Potter follows with "The Minstrel," her charming story of a lord who promises his dying mother he will only marry for love and becomes a traveling musician in order to find a woman who can make his own heart sing. "The Bachelor Knight," Deborah Simmons's story of a valiant but lowly born knight who is forced to honor an old vow and marry a lady so that she can retain her holdings, and Glynnis Campbell's "The Siege," a romantic tale of a knight and his reluctant intended, unaware of the other's identity and trapped together during an assault on her family's castle, nicely round out the collection. A worthy collection that should appeal to most medieval romance fans.
Copyright 2001 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.