Paul Doherty is a masterful writer of medieval historical fiction. He deals in this and other novels with the early 14th century, and with the two King Edwards. This one is set in 1312 when King Edward II rules, sort of. It would be better to say that chaos rules. Edward is losing a war on the border against the Scots, and meanwhile, while the king’s away….. the underlings do their bidding. This novel centers on the actual famous theft of royal treasure whose thieves, oddly enough involved monks from Westminster Abbey among others. Corbett and his right hand man, Ranulf act as avenging angels of the king, against these and other malefactors.
The story is set at Dartmoor, involves wild beasts, and a taverner named Baskerville—- all this a nice hommage to Conan Doyle’s famous The Hound of the Baskervilles. These novels are full of intrigue, mystery, violence, lechery and conspiracy against the rulers. Sounds rather like January 6th last year in America. Doherty’s detailed knowledge of the history comes into play, and he has a very excellent gift of vivid description. One of the constant head-scratching things is during a age when most everyone was claiming to be Christian, it is indeed a mystery how they could reconcile that with so much deception, theft, violence, lechery, a veritable litany of the seven deadly sins. One wonders how many deserved the title Christian at all.
To be sure Hugh Corbett is a devout man, but he is often caught between the not so righteous machinations of rulers and his faith in God. He struggles at times with his conscience as he seeks to do the king’s bidding, and at the same time uphold justice. I have especially enjoyed watching the development of the relationship between Corbett and his right hand man, Ranulf. My one wish was that there was more time and space in more of these novels (now 22 and counting in the Corbett series) for describing Hugh’s home life with his wife Maeve and the children. In any case, this is one of Doherty’s best novels, and until the great reveal at the end, you are left scratching your head and trying to figure out how many villains there really were on Dartmoor. Inquiring minds want to know and only Corbett is able to unravel the cloak of mystery and reveal the truth.
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