Review: The Mirror of Simple Souls by Aline Kiner

Synopsis: A captivating story of love, jealousy and faith, set amid a community of independent women in medieval Paris — the perfect summer read for fans of historical fiction.

This thrilling, sensual evocation of medieval Paris sold over 100,000 copies in France and offers a fascinating insight into the world of the beguines — communities of women who lived independently of men and successfully managed their own affairs all the way back in the Middle Ages.

A heretical text, a vengeful husband, a forbidden love...

It's 1310 and Paris is alive with talk of the trial of the Templars. Religious repression is on the rise, and the smoke of execution pyres blackens the sky above the city. But sheltered behind the walls of Paris's great beguinage, a community of women are still free to work, study and live their lives away from the domination of men.

When a wild, red-haired child clothed in rags arrives at the beguinage gate one morning, with a sinister Franciscan monk on her tail, she sets in motion a chain of events that will shatter the peace of this little world-plunging it into grave danger...

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Historical fiction set in the Beguinage of Paris 1310 - 1317.

The Beguines were usually women who lived in semi-monastic communities but did not take formal religious vows, were allowed to leave at any time, though they did promise not to marry whilst within the community. Beguines were part of a larger spiritual revival movement of the 13th century, that soon attracted the attention of secular and clerical authorities, and came under criticism as a result of their ambiguous social and legal status. The decline of the Beguines in Paris commenced around 1312 - after the death of Margaret Porete.

Paris 1300s

The story opens with the trial of the doomed mystic Marguerite Porete (who was burned at the stake in Paris on charges of heresy in 1310) and of a fleeing young woman, Mahaut, who is rescued and protected by the Beguine, Ysabel.

And after that the story pretty much falls flat. I'm really not sure what was trying to be achieved - a history of the Beguines, historical fiction, a linkage around the title of Margaret Porete's book .... maybe a sense of lost in translation as I certainly felt no connection to the plot or characters.  A case of what might have been ..