Customer Reviews

The Lark's Lament: A Fools' Guild Mystery (Fools' Guild Mysteries)

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Alan Gordon has become one of my favorite mystery writers over the past couple of years, ever since a friend recommended his Fool's Guild series to me. :-)

His books are witty and intelligent (one of them is a sequel of sorts to Shakespeare's Twelth Night and another purports to tell the true story behind Hamlet). And he covers two of the Crusades (the one involving Richard Lionheart and the one that resulted in the sacking of Constantinople).

The premise behind these books is wonderful - that all of the fools and jesters (and some troubadors) in Christianity and the Muslim worlds belong to a Guild who collects information and pushes to bring peace to a violent world. So yes - the Fools push and meddle!

They follow the story of Theo and his beloved wife Claudia (the Guild name of a well known Shakespeare character!) and their associates.

In this novel they are in southern France trying to recruit a current abbott (former famous troubador) into helping the Guild, which is currently being persecuted by the Church. A murder occurs at the abbey, and the abbott agrees to help out if the Fools can solve the crime.

To solve the crime, they must track down the lyrics and history of an obscure song through the south of France, while people are murdered around them.

As usual in this series, the book is filled with wit, and the Fools are a complete delight!

The premise of this one is that there was once a secret society of jesters, a "Fools Guild" much like other medieval guilds (albeit of more prosaic trades), which recruited, trained and deployed court jesters and many of the minstrels of the era throughout the courts and towns of late medieval Europe as spies and agents provocateur.

In this mystery, series hero and "fool" Theophilos (his guild name) travels to a distant abbey in southern France with his wife, the fool Claudia, their young apprentice Helga, and their baby daughter, Portia, to recruit the abbot of the monastery for service to the Guild. The abbot, himself a former troubadour named Folquet, now going by the name of Folc, is a one time Guild member whom the Guild now needs to do some work in their favor inside the Church against the ministrations of an unfriendly Pope in Rome. The Fools Guild, itself, seems to be some sort of secret order spun off at some point in the past by the Church since its head is a certain Father Gerald (I suppose one has to read the earlier books in the series to get the full story here).

Shortly after Theophilos' arrival at the abbey, murder intervenes, as it inevitably does in such mysteries, and Theo and his family must take time out to solve the mystery of a cryptic message scrawled on the wall of the librarium in the murdered victim's blood or lose the chance that Abbot Folc will condescend to aid them in their mission. Their search for the meaning of the blood soaked words takes them over the mountains to a women's religious order and then on to Marseilles on the coast and after this to yet another city, the growing town of Montpellier. As they make their way, they endure the rigours of the road along with one another's clever one-liners and double entendres as befits medieval foolery. In Marseilles they find another fool to help them and smoke out a second in Montpellier where things come to a head with the discovery of a noble family's dirty secrets, and another murder, as the fools seek to learn the identity of the mysterious Lady Lark at the center of the mysterious song -- and why she matters.

The writing is tight and fast paced, the mystery engaging, as is the endless banter between the fools and everyone else. I found the switching of points of view from chapter to chapter a little disorienting since the voices all sound much the same, even the blacksmith in Montpellier giving as good as he gets, and I would have liked more depth to the main characters. But that could well have slowed the read and the beauty of this book lies not in the richness of its characters but the depth and wit of the prose itself which can be read and appreciated on numerous levels.

Alan Gordon succeeds, as well, in creating a credible facsimile of the medieval world in spite of the remarkably modern sensibility of his players. The elements never jar but meld together, seamlessly, to create a completely convincing experience both of mystery, with a touch of adventure, and of the medieval European world as it might have been in the southern France of that day.

Gordon's final end note is also cleverly done and puts his tale in amusing perspective. I especially loved the scholarly references. More, his obvious familiarity with old French and Latin lend an air of gravitas which only enhances the read. In sum this one kept me going, and entranced, for the two days I needed to finish it. Though I'm not usually a fan of mysteries, I expect I'll be picking up some of the others in this series now. If not yet a convert to mysteries generally, I am at least a convert to Gordon's world of Fools.

SWM
author of The King of Vinland's Saga and A Raft on the River

In 1204 the Fool's Guild leadership is very concerned that Pope Inncentius (Innocent III) is outraged by their secular interference in what he deems church business. To reduce the papal hostility, Theophilos the Fool and his wife Claudia, also of the Fool's Guild, travel to Le Thoronet Abbey to see former member Cistercian Abbot Folc, who performed as the legendary Folquet. He welcomes his friends, but is hesitant to get caught between his former and present life as that has no future.

That night, someone slashes the throat of a monk leaving a note on the wall written in the dead man's blood addressed to the abbot when he was a troubadour: "FOLQUET: COLD IS THE HAND THAT CRUSHES THE LARK". Upset Folc offers his visitors a deal; his intervention with the papal enemies in exchange for Theo and Claudia uncovering the identity of the killer threatening him. The married Fools agree and look into Folc's past as Folquet for clues. They visit his wife and learn that the abbot was a womanizer and that the bloody message comes from a song. As they travel to France, a killer seems one step ahead of them leaving corpses for them to find and only being talented Fools have the married duet stayed alive so far.

More history than mystery although the whodunit is clever and used as the device that enables the lead couple to escort readers on a tour of the early thirteenth century Fool's Guild and the Church in France. The story line is fast-paced, but it is the appeal of the Fool's Family (Theo, Claudia, and to a degree their children Portia and Helga) that make the tale fun to follow as their performances provide insight and comedic relief. Readers who appreciate a fine medieval tale with a mystery enhancing the period piece will enjoy the sixth performance of Alan Gordon's fabulous Fool's Guild.

Harriet Klausner

In a genre full of writers whose work I adore, Alan Gordon is among my most cherished favorites. His books are unique, medieval mysteries that are unlike all others. He writes about fools, positing that all the fools in the middle ages, including all those in Shakespeare, were part of a guild that operated like a middle ages CIA -- they ran around meddling in affairs. The outstanding first book in this series is Thirteenth Night (Fools' Guild Mysteries); each and every book since has more than fulfilled the promise of this utterly original and thoroughly engaging premise.

THE LARK'S LAMENT, sixth in the series, is great fun. It take the characters and the series in a new direction, to the south of France in 1204 where Theophilos, his wife Claudia, their daughter Portia and a delightful apprentice named Helga get involved in some intrigue involving a troubadour-turned-abbot and the cryptic lyrics in one of his songs. As the fools race to uncover the lyrics' meaning, two people are killed. They realize that they're not the only ones on the trail.

I recommend these books to practically everyone, even folks who would not ordinarily pick up a historical mystery. The witty banter and the charming characters are so original and so endearing that these books appeal to all readers who love a good mystery -- and a good laugh!

The Lark's Lament is the sixth book in Alan Gordon's highly enjoyable Fools' Guild series of medieval mysteries. To anyone not familiar with this series, you will need to start with the first book, Thirteenth Night, as the series actually does progress through actual history and the events do affect the characters' lives.

Gordon began the series with a remarkable conceit: his two principal characters are Feste (Theophilos to his fellow members of the Fools' Guild) and Viola (guild-named Claudia) from Shakespeare's Twelfth Night, with Gordon's Thirteenth Night taking up the story and telling us what became of them afterwards. What Gordon also does is to ground his stories in actual history, but with the premise of a secret organization - the Fools' Guild - working behind the scenes to guide events, trying to make things better if they can or to at least keep them from being any worse.

In The Lark's Lament, the year is 1204 and the Fools' Guild is under attack by the church under Pope Innocent III, who regards them as rivals and interlopers in church affairs. Theophilos, along with his wife Claudia, their apprentice Helga and their infant daughter Portia, have been sent by the Guild to France to convince a former Guild member who is now an abbot of a monastery, that his services are again needed. A murder of a monk becomes the key to their mission's success as the reluctant abbot agrees to help _only_ if they can find out who murdered the monk and why.

As always, Gordon keeps things moving in terms of the mystery but at the same time keeps us intimately involved in Theophilos and Claudia's lives as they make their living, raise their infant daughter and train their apprentice. One of the continuing delights of the serious is seeing how seriously the professional fools of the guild take their fooling:

" 'Apprentice, front and center!'
Helga scampered through the hay and stood at attention before us. She was a spry young girl of twelve, although small enough to pass for younger if the need arose. I had thought she was ten when we first met. When her hair was washed, it was blond. Or so we believed.
'You followed my story about Rome with an excellent bit of improvisation,' I began. 'Full marks.'
'Thank you, Master,' she said.
'Your command of langue d'oc is excellent, and any slips in the accent we can attribute to your constant travel,' I continued. 'Your performance tonight was generally good. However, in the part where you were hitting me in the face with the broom, you actually hit me in the face with the broom.'
'You can't fault her for that,' objected Claudia. 'She's standing on top of your shoulders while you're lurching about the fire.'
'But she knows which way I'm lurching,' I said. 'Or she should know. Anything that could throw me off balance could end up sending one of us into that fire, and I know which one I will choose if that happens. Roast apprentice is an excellent dish for early autumn.'
'Maybe the routine is too hard for her,' said Claudia.
'No, it isn't,' said Helga. 'I made the mistake. When I'm on his shoulders, it's step left, back, whack, back, right, whack, left, right, whack, forward, whack, back, whack, and jump. I was early on the third whack.'
'Exactly,' I said.
'I'll rehearse it in the morning,' she said. ' After exercises.'
'Yes, you will,' I said. 'Now, get some sleep, little one.'
...
'You were hard on her,' whispered Claudia.
'Because she's good,' I said. 'Did you notice her imitating you?'
'I sound nothing like that!' she protested.
'No, it must have been someone else,' I said. 'Someone else with the exact same voice as you.'"

My only quibble with this book in the series is regarding the motivation of one of the characters responsible for the murder. I can't go into detail without revealing too much. All I can say is that when the motive for that character was revealed, I didn't buy into it; particularly when a better and more believable motive was right there to be had. That said, however, the book was still quite an enjoyable read, and fans of the series will not be disappointed. Highly recommended.

Alan Gordon has another winner. As technically fascinating (in a medieval way) as Patricia Cornwell and as humorous as a Janet Evans, with brilliantly enlightening historical backgrounds laced with Shakespeare.