Sun 21 Dec 2014
ELLIS PETERS – City of Gold and Shadows. Macmillan, UK, hardcover, 1973. William Morrow, US, hardcover, 1974. Pyramid V3590, paperback, February 1975.
If she is remembered today, and I think she is, Ellis Peters is known almost solely for her series of Brother Cadfael mysteries, of which there were 20. running from 1977 to 1994. But she also had another series before Cadfael came along — he was a monk living in a 12th-century Benedictine monastery — that being a series of contemporary detective novels about the Felse family.
This earlier series, in which the head of family, George Felse, was a British police detective, ran from 1951 to 1979 and overlapped the Cadfael books by one. (I believe that the first Cadfael novel was meant to be a one-off, but it proved to be so popular that Peters was forced to continue them until her death in 1995 at the age of 82.)
I was going to start off this review by saying something witty about the fact that when City of Gold and Shadows was reprinted by Pyramid, they amusingly tried to cash in on the then current Gothics craze in paperback publishing and marketing as a Gothic romance. It is in fact so labeled on the spine.
But the cover of British hardcover, also shown here (below), is even more in the Gothic mode, so there goes that opening.
It is a fact, however, that the book certainly does start out as the Gothics of the era often did. A girl (in this case a concert oboist named Charlotte Rossignol) is invited to meet with a lawyer who informs her that her great-uncle, a famed archaeologist, has been missing for over a year, and that she is in essence the inheritor of his estate — or that she will be if for some reason he never shows up.
A standard opening for a Gothic romance. You might think that she would then go to her uncle’s estate, a mouldering mansion filled with servants with inscrutable motives and a young man who …
But no. Charlotte is the kind of woman with a head on her shoulders, and she decides to do some detective work on her own. She heads for the grounds of Aurae Phiala, where the ruins of an ancient Roman town are buried, somewhere along the border with Wales, and although his travels had taken him to Turkey afterward, it is where her uncle was last seen in England.
She does meet a young man, but she counters his tentative advances with an even more interrogative set of questions of her own, subtly inquired, of course. There is a murder, that of an inquisitive young lad, and other attempts at murder. Serious business, this, and George Felse is called in.
His wife remains off scene in this one, though, and his son shows up not at all. At about the one-third point this becomes a matter for the police, not one for amateurs, although even Felse recognizes the usefulness of Charlotte’s continued contributions.
A major plus is that Ellis Peters was a very good writer, and this book is no exception. Her phrasing, eye for details and incidental authorial observations are nearly pitch perfect, and the chapters in which one of the characters tries to find his way out of the maze of tunnels and underground flues into which he has been tossed are as suspenseful as anything I’ve recently read in a book that has been marketed as a thriller.
December 21st, 2014 at 6:50 pm
My first Peters novel was PIPER ON THE MOUNTAIN featuring Dominic Felse (the son) and his sister, a Buchanesque piece still with a good mystery. While I admire the Cadfael books I think I liked the variety of the Felse books a bit more and they were exceptionally well written — as were the Cadfael books.
The first Felse novel was adapted as an episode of the ALFRED HITCHCOCK HOUR with the setting moved to the US and George a sheriff.
For a brief time I had Ellis confused with Elizabeth Peters, but it was a useful confusion since neither writer ever disappointed me.
December 21st, 2014 at 7:58 pm
I enjoyed the Cadfael books for a while, but I think I started to tire of historical mysteries in general, so I eventually stopped.
If I read any more of Ellis Peters’ books any time soon, I’m sure it will be a Felse book. I can’t find my review of it, but I enjoyed the other one in the series that read. Yes, I agree. The scope of the books in the Felse series is a lot more than in the Cadfael’s, but I’m sure no one remembers them today.
December 23rd, 2014 at 5:43 pm
Steve, try Death and the Joyful Woman – the best book I’ve read this year – I had a binge on Felse Family novels and read (or re-read) a whole load and really enjoyed them all – The Grass Widow’s Tale is also to be recommended. The Felse books are not only very well written they are also cleverly plotted. I read a Cadfael (a late one – The Confession of Brother Haluin) and was rather disappointed – not nearly as good as the early ones I’ve read
December 23rd, 2014 at 6:10 pm
From a short synopsis of the plot that I found online, I’m sure that DEATH AND THE JOYFUL WOMAN is one (or even the one) in the series that I have read before. Perhaps if I keep looking I’ll find the review I wrote about it at the time. I’ll add my recommendation to yours, Jamie, and add that it won an Edgar for the best book of the year, sometime in the early 60s.