Guenevere, Queen of the Summer Country

This is the first part of a trilogy chronicling the life of Queen Guenevere. Beginning with the young King Arthur preparing for the war which will unite Britain, the book recounts Guenevere and Arthur’s marriage, the growth of Arthur’s Court and Guenevere’s adulterous affair with Lancelot. Although told mainly from Guenevere’s point of view, this is a truly epic narrative, encompassing pageantry, political intrigue, war and the conflict between the old pagan religion and Christianity. At times earthy, sensual and violent, it is a powerful romantic drama firmly rooted in historical Britain. A modern yet traditional retelling of the stories given definitive form in the first four books of Thomas Malory’s Le Morte Darthur. The characters are grippingly evoked as realistic, living and breathing human beings, rather than simple archetypes, yet the writing is effortlessly lyrical, with the elegant flow of folk- tale. For emotional depth Guenevere is comparable to Parke Godwin’s fine Arthurian romance, Firelord. This title is Rosalind Miles seventeenth book. She is the author of the highly praised I, Elizabeth and The Women’s History of the World. In 1990 she won the Network Award for outstanding achievement in the field of writing, and the same year she was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. –Gary S. Dalkin END