And she’s
back! In my review of “The Bastard’s
Tale” last week, I theorized there were two people writing as Margaret
Frazer. One likes to write exciting
murder mysteries while the other likes the more subtle, intrigue-laden stories. “The Widow’s Tale” was written by the first
writer, which means it moves at a much faster and therefore, must better pace.
The novel
focuses on a young woman who loses her husband to an untimely and unidentified
illness. After his death, his greedy
cousins immediately move in, taking over his manor and its holdings. They kidnap the widow Cristiana and cart her
off to a nunnery for “penance”, telling the nuns many lies and forbidding
anyone to talk to her. Of course, the nunnery turns out to be St. Frideswide
and soon Dame Frevisse is up to her eyeballs in a new mess. When Master John Say, a close associate of
Cristiana “rescues” her, Domina Elisabeth and Frevisse are obligated to go with
her.
The
future of Cristiana and her daughters is caught in a tug-of-war between Say and
Cristiana’s cousins-in-law. Fortunately,
Frevisse can watch from the sidelines and not get sucked into the middle of
everything.
Until her
cousin Alice de la Pole, duchess of Suffolk, charges her with finding a traitor
among the household. The real murder
mystery doesn’t begin until three-fourths of the way through the novel. Still there is enough action to keep the
reader interested but this pattern of alternating slow-fast stories, one can
predict how the next book will read.
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