The Twice-Hanged Man

Description

It is Autumn, 1282. Edward I, more often hammering the Scots, is at war with Wales and it is not going as well as he wished. Everyone is edgy on both sides of the loosely defined border between England and Wales. Crucial battles have been lost. Raids are common. Death is a constant threat. Prioress Eleanor is escorting her younger brother, Robert, and his wife, who is in labour, from their Marcher lands to greater safety at a Wynethorpe manor in a village just inside the English border. With her are Brother Thomas and Sister Anne, the sub-infirmarian and a good woman to have at a difficult birth. The baby arrives, a girl. Mother and child may be healthy, but Death never wanders far from this beloved Prioress - whether she's home at Tyndal in Norfolk or traveling the realm. The local abbot begs her help - the village priest has been found dead and standing over him is, a reliable witness says, the ghost of Hywel, the village stonemason yet a Welshman, and recently hanged for slaying some sleeping English soldiers. The abbot has failed to exorcise this malign spirit - surely the saintly visitors from Tyndal Priory in far away Norfolk, can do the job. Bone tired, Eleanor questions the village hangman, who assures the religious party that Hywel was hanged once and then, when the weight of the fat felon strung up alongside him broke the beam, was hanged again. The experienced executioner checked all the bodily signs - Hywel was dead. But where is his grave? And why is the hangman quite soon found hanged? And what manner of secrets are so many of the locals - the sheriff and his household, the spice merchant, Maud the Bawd - keeping? 'Prioress Eleanor returns in another of Royal's historically detailed and expertly executed medieval whodunits. This fifteenth entry featuring Eleanor and Brother Thomas once again features a main mystery as well as intriguing subplots involving the series' recurring characters' - Booklist

Priscilla Royal, author of fourteen books from Poisoned Pen Press in the Prioress Eleanor and Brother Thomas medieval mystery series, grew up in British Columbia and earned a BA in World Literature at San Francisco State University where she discovered the beauty of medieval literature. Before retiring from the Federal Government in 2000, she worked in a variety of jobs, all of which provided an excellent education in the complexity of human experience and motivation. She is a theater fan as well as a reader of history, mystery, and fiction of lesser violence. When not hiding in the thirteenth century, she lives in Northern California and is a member of California Writers Club, Mystery Writers of America, and Sisters in Crime.

"Royal meticulously depicts life at Mynchen Buckland, which was a part of the Hospitaller order, its pious mission intertwined with the military efforts of the Crusader knights. She also pays close attention to all three of the visitors-turned-sleuths. Instead of functioning as main-character sidekicks or listening posts, Brother Thomas and Sister Anne use their respective gifts to astutely unravel crucial strands to the mystery, helping to bring the story to a satisfying conclusion. Royal shows once again why she stands in the front rank of medieval mystery authors." (starred review) * Publishers Weekly review of Wild Justice * "The 15th adventure for Royal's clever, conflicted prioress continues her mastery of the medieval, provides a mystery that's twisty but not impenetrable, and advances the ongoing story of the problematic sexual relationships of the continuing cast." * Kirkus Reviews * "Royal seamlessly integrates historical events into what stands as one her best puzzles, the most Agatha Christie-like in terms of motive." (starred review) * Publishers Weekly *