AD 1062. One day warrior Countess Matilde will rule like a man, and inherit her mother's mysterious relics, but she cannot escape the marriage arranged for her.
When her enigmatic overlord King Heinrich rescues her from her abusive husband, friendship blossoms into forbidden love. But her personal journey has only just begun.
A medieval tale of love, political intrigue, and relic hunting.
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A fictional account of the early life of Matilda of Canossa, a formidable women who stood up for what she believed in, in the face of opposition from more powerful political players. And that is where my interest started and stopped.
By the author's own words, the plot is entirely fictitious and is her own creative attempt to tie up "historical" loose ends, to provide both herself and the reader a semblance of a satisfactory explanation / conclusion to historical events that actually presented none and to fill in gaps in the historical chronology.
Unfortunately, it read more like a medieval Dan Brown novel than what could have been a more considered and structured historical novel of a woman at the centre of one of the most important political and religious events of not only her time but of our own.
To throw in relic hunting and an undocumented illicit love affair in order to explain things or tie up loose ends is really doing your subject a great disservice - and just didn't work on so many levels.
I will be labeling this one as alternate historical fiction - as that is what it represents, especially for those of us who have actually taken the time to get to know Matilda and invest in her story a little more seriously. I won't be pursuing the second in this series.
If you are truly interest in Matilda, then invest in "The Military Leadership of Matilda of Canossa 1046-1115" by David J. Hay or even "Tuscan Countess: The Life and Extraordinary Times of Matilda of Canossa" by Michele K. Spike
