I am at a point (age) in my life when I no longer stand on the principle of finishing any book I start ... so it's saying something that I did finish it. Guess the main problem with this one is that all too often I was relieved to get to the end of a chapter so I could put the book down and do something else - like rearrange my sock drawer!
I read the first three books of this series back to back: (Roselynde, Alinor & Joanna). And, maybe if I had spaced the books out a little, they would not have been as tiring - but that's exactly what they became - tiring, wearying, tedious, etc. And, I can say with no regret that I am quite through w/ the series.
I enjoyed the characters and the plots and I believe Gellis does an admirable job of portraying King Richard / King John medieval England. I also enjoyed reading books where the central character is a strong woman. High marks on all these factors. Dialog, character development, descriptive writing all very good.
My problem is that in all three books, Gellis feels the need to unduly create conflict between the main characters based on miscommunication, misperceptions, statements blown out of proportion, etc., etc. What we end up with are lots of pages of internal thinking and reflection and mental wringing of hands and then resultant mistakes which just starts the whole process over again. I was reminded more than once of the old childhood game of "he loves me; he loves me not." I wanted to scream, "Good grief, just talk to him/her!"
As only one of many examples throughout all three books, Joanna gets it into her head that her husband has been unfaithful to her (with no real substance in the storyline to support her belief). We get a page or two of her thinking and ill-conceived logic. So, naturally she feels slighted and sulls up. This makes her husband think she no longer cares about him and we get a page or two of his angst. They circle around each other for a few days before all finds a way of getting straighted out.
Also, I believe Roberta Gellis is a bit hard on King John. I know he had his faults, but she paints him as the devil incarnate and that got a little tiring also. She was also very harsh in her portrayal of Queen Isabella.
I'm passing all three books on to my daughter; although I was tempted to de-recommend them. I finally decided to send them on to her based on the good qualities of the books that I have already mentioned. (Let's admit it - as mothers, we are always eager for our daughters to read books about strong, empowered women.)
For the most part they are very readable and decent historical fiction. However, that said, I will not be surprised if she gets bored and sets them aside for something else. It certainly nearly happened to me!Recommendation: Good for an airplane trip, beach read or if you have nothing else to read.
Rating: 7 out of 10.
