Review: Warriors and Monks by Michael A Ponzio

Synopsis: Pons, born to a noble family in the south of France in 1075, is given to the Church at the age of four. He becomes a Benedictine monk and thrives in the monastery as a devotee of the Order’s rules, working, praying, and studying.

Reaching adulthood, he falls in love with Primavera, a woman in the nearby village, but the Church’s renewed enforcement of celibacy endangers their relationship.

It is a lawless time when people of the land are threatened with violence as they cultivate their fields or travel on pilgrimage. The monks are compelled to become warriors, defending themselves with farm tools and walking staves.

Pons is elected as Abbot of Cluny Monastery. He is torn amidst his sense of duty as the powerful leader of Cluny, rivaling the Pope, his love for Primavera, and the calling to join the crusade to save Jerusalem.

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Reading some of the reviews (after I had finished the book), I found myself wondering if I was indeed reading the same book - fastpaced??? cliffhangers?? Not my copy.

This is a slow, plodding, historical novel on the life of Pons of Melgueil, Abbot of Cluny. Yes, there is warriors, monks, action, adventure and romance - but there it ended for me.

I found the subject at hand - Pons - at considerable odds with himself. One the one hand, here was a man who strictly followed the Benedictine Rule and sought to impose it upon others, highly critical of those who deviated from the original intent of the Saint; and yet on the other hand, he was a morally weak man, who succumbed to earthly desires at the first sight of a fluttered eyelid or shapely ankle - and with a queen to boot. I guess the tome would have been rather boring otherwise - but this left me less than impressed.

Checking out the titles of the author's other books, I get the impression that all novels to date revolve around the author's surname and possible ancestry links.

Read: December 2025

Going to Church in Medieval England by Nicholas Orme

An engaging, richly illustrated account of parish churches and churchgoers in England, from the Anglo-Saxons to the mid-sixteenth century.

Parish churches were at the heart of English religious and social life in the Middle Ages and the sixteenth century. In this comprehensive study, Nicholas Orme shows how they came into existence, who staffed them, and how their buildings were used. He explains who went to church, who did not attend, how people behaved there, and how they—not merely the clergy—affected how worship was staged.

The book provides an accessible account of what happened in the daily and weekly services, and how churches marked the seasons of Christmas, Lent, Easter, and summer. It describes how they celebrated the great events of life: birth, coming of age, and marriage, and gave comfort in sickness and death. A final chapter covers the English Reformation in the sixteenth century and shows how, alongside its changes, much that went on in parish churches remained as before.

read more in this article by Monica Greep @ Mail Online