“The King’s Justice” by E.M. Powell

It’s 1176 A.D., during the reign of Henry II (1133-1189). We may not be sure of the status of Henry’s queen, Eleanor of Aquitaine, but his former friend and now-dead Thomas a Becket, cut down in Canterbury Cathedral at the king’s behest, has been dead almost six years. Henry, for his part, is determined to exercise control over his dominions, and one way to do that is to bring the king’s justice to all parts of the realm.

Judges appointed by Henry are traveling the country, hearing cases, investigating alleged crimes, and meting out justice. Determinations of guilt could be as brutal as the sentences for guilt; often the innocent suffer as much as the guilty. The court visiting the city of York is quick to investigate, using methods like the water judgment. If you sink, you’re innocent; if you float, you’re guilty. Either likely resulted in drowning.

One of the clerks attached to the court is Aelred Barling, something of a dry stick and something of an avid stickler for the law. One of the court messengers is a young man named Hugo Stanton, who’s more interested in drinking and local prostitutes than he is in fulfilling his job. A case of both men being in the wrong place at the wrong time results in their being sent to Claresham, a small Yorkshire village some distance away. Barling is to investigate the murder of the village blacksmith, believed to have been at the hands of a vagrant hiding in the woods. The village, the blacksmith’s daughter, and the local lord are all demanding swift justice.

It is Stanton who sees that the clues don’t point in the vagrant’s direction, but at some other (unnamed) person or persons. An unlikely pair, Barling and Stanton soon find themselves engulfed in far more murders than that of the blacksmith.

E.M. Powell

The King’s Justice by E.M. Powell is the first of the Stanton and Barlow medieval murder mysteries by E.M. Powell, and it’s so fast-paced that you need to pay close attention to characters, scenes, and plot development. And the suspects abound, until they begin to get killed off, one by one.

The second novel in the series is The Monastery Murders (2018). Powell has also written three novels in the Fifth Knight series: The Fifth Knight (2012), The Blood of the Fifth Knight (2015), and The Lord of Ireland(2016). Born and raised in the Republic of Ireland in the family of Michael Collins (founder of the free state), she lives in England.She’s a member of the Historical Novel Society, International Thriller Writers, and Romance Writers of America.

The King’s Justice is a well-research and entertaining historical mystery, full of unexpected turns and a detective duo that seem mismatched but gradually come to complement each other.

Top illustration: The coronation of Henry II in June 1170. 

“The Wake Up” by Catherine Ryan Hyde

Aiden Delacorte, 40, is a cattle rancher and horse breeder who’s been exhibiting some strange behavior. He balks at performing the normal tasks of a cattle roundup, almost injuring himself in the process. He lets his ranch hands go. His girlfriend walks away, unable to understand what’s happened to him.

Something has happened to Aiden. He’s started experiencing the feelings of the animals he’s around – cattle, horses, dogs, and even rabbits. He’d never considered what animals might experience, but he’s more than considering them now. He’s also decided to sell his cattle and get our of the cattle ranching business altogether.

He gains a new girlfriend, Gwen, new to town and with problems of her own. She has two children, 13-year-old Elizabeth, who’s easy to like, and 10-year-old Milo, who isn’t. Milo has serious behavior problems, stemming from physical abuse by his father. 

Aiden’s psychiatrist tells him he’s an empath – a person who is highly sensitive to those around him. Empathy with animals is unusual; in Aiden’s case, it may be a first step toward empathy with people. 

How theses broken people learn to understand and deal with each other is the story of The Wake Up by Catherine Ryan Hyde. And the story is compelling and difficult to put down.

Catherine Ryan Hyde

The relationship between Aiden and Milo slowly takes center stage. Aiden begins to sense Milo’s feelings, and sometimes lack of them, and tries to find a way to reach the boy. That Milo had a tendency to hurt animals doesn’t help.

Hyde is the author of more than 30 novels, the best known of which is Pay It Forward, which was released as a movie in 2000 and starred Kevin Spacey and Helen Hunt. The Wake Up was published in 2017.

Hyde employs a deft use of tension between the man and the boy that ebbs and flows. Aiden gradually comes to understand how much of Milo’s story is also his own story, and the question is whether resolution can be reached for both of them. 

Top photograph by Kenny Webster via Unsplash. Used with permission.

From "Dancing Priest"

“This young man was more than just David’s roommate, wasn’t he?” Gran said.

Sarah nodded.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“I love him Gran. I love him and I can’t love him. He has this enormous faith in God. He’ll be ordained a minister when he returns from the Olympics and then he goes to Africa.”

“Is it the religion, Sarah?” Grand said.

Sarah nodded again. “I just don’t have it. It just doesn’t work for me. But it’s everything about him.”

     - From Dancing Priest 

Photograph by Brooke Cagle via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Poets and Poems: Luke Kennard and “Planet-Shaped Horse”

When you’ve written an entire book of poetry about the biblical character of Cain, like British poet Luke Kennard has done, it should be a surprise to find his other books of poetry are just as surprising and just as entertaining, and tell often wildly entertaining stories, as the work on Cain.

Consider Kennard’s 2013 collection Planet-Shaped Horse. There is no title poem. He ranges on subjects and a landscape that often seem disjointed and playful while simultaneously discussing subjects as varied as the prophet Elijah and the flatness of one’s elbows. He writes about his own death, stupid words, hermits, the idea of pilgrimage, being a snob and time capsules. A character named Miranda appears in several of the poems, and you wonder if she’s a girlfriend, a literary device, a muse, or perhaps someone who’s keeping the poet honest.

To continue reading, please see my post today at Tweetspeak Poetry.

"The Boy in the Striped Pajamas" by John Boyne

It’s one of the most disturbing books for children I’ve ever read.

Bruno is a nine-year-old boy living in a large home with his parents and older sister in a well-to-do section of Berlin, with the grandparents living next door. In many ways, the family seems like a normal family. Bruno loves sliding down the banister from the top to the bottom of the house. He considers his sister a “hopeless case” (what nine-year-old boy doesn’t consider his older sister a hopeless case?). his house is so large that he keeps finding new things to explore. He has good friends at school.

All seems familiar, except this is 1942. His father wears an impressive uniform and seems to be an influential person. Even some well-known person, whom Bruno calls “The Fury,” has taken an interest in his father. And the family is moving to a new home, because his father has taken an important job, a job Bruno’s heard his parents arguing about. 

The family moves, and Bruno’s new house is much smaller than his house in Berlin. If he stands on his tiptoes, he can see out of a room in his home to wear people are milling about. They all wear striped pajamas. Bruno understands the name of this new home to be “Out-With.”

And we know, if Bruno doesn’t, that his father is the new commandant of the Auschwitz concentration camp. We know who “The Fury is,” and why the people at Out-With all wear striped pajamas. 

The Boy in the Striped Pajamas was published in 2008 by Irish writer John Boyne. The book, published in a 10^thanniversary paperback edition, won two Irish book awards, was shortlisted for the British Book Award, reached No. 1 on The New York Timesbestsellers list, and was turned into a movie. It’s a difficult book to put down and a difficult book to read; we experience an almost helpless feeling as we watch Bruno in his innocence, desperate to find a friend, discover the reality of Out-With, a reality he never fully comprehends. Boyne effectively uses the gap between the reader’s knowledge and the boy’s ignorance to create first a sense of uneasiness and then a growing sense of horror.

John Boyne

Boyne has written 11 novels for adults and five for children, including The Heart’s Invisible Furies, A Ladder to the Sky, The House of Special Purpose, The Boy at the Top of the Mountain, The Absolutist, This House is Haunted, A History of Loneliness, Next of Kin, Crippen, The Thief of Time, Mutiny, Beneath the Earth, Noah Barleywater Runs Away, The Dare, The Congress of Rough Riders, The Brocketts Get a Dog, The Second Child, Stay Where You Are and Then Leave, and Cyril Avery. He lives in Dublin.

At some point, we know where The Boy in the Striped Pajamas is headed; the ending seems inevitable even as we resist the inevitability. It’s a story that holds us in fascination and horror. I can’t say I would feel comfortable with recommending that children read this book, but then I didn’t feel comfortable reading this book. But comfort isn’t the point.

Top photograph: The commandant’s house at Auschwitz.

The law

After Psalm 1

The law, we understand,

is what to do or not,

what is allowed,

what is not,

instructions, restrictions

and yet more

more: the entire teaching

more: the entire message

more: the entire story

not only the do’s

not only the do not’s

but also the story

all of it

in detail and

glorious technicolor

the wind blows

the wind carries the chaff away

the wind knocks the seed to the soil

all of it

the entire story

Photograph by Chris Brignola via Unsplash. Used with permission.

View from the Underground

He looked out of the window into the darkness of the underground. Almost ten months earlier, Trevor’s life had changed with a single phone from Josh Gittings, once the prime minister’s political assistant but better known as the PM’s hatchet man. Now chief of staff to King Michael, he’d contacted Trevor, asking him to meet with the king. Somehow Gittings had ferreted out Trevor’s hobby and avocation – monarchial law and history. The king, Gittings, said, needed help understanding the history, role, and legal considerations for being the monarch. Trevor had been as stunned as his wife and his colleagues on chambers. Never before had he been called upon to advise a king, and on a subject his colleagues often snickered at. They called him “The Monarchist.” That was then. Now they called him “The Rain Man.” 

-       From Dancing Prophet

Photograph by Christopher Rusev via Unsplash. Used with permission.