A Plague on Both Your Houses [Hardcover]

Susanna Gregory (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

In Gregory's third novel to feature medieval Cambridge physician Matthew Bartholomew and his colleague Brother Michael (A Bone of Contention, LJ 12/97), the attempt to find the murderer of a man found attached to a waterwheel takes a backseat to the arrival of the Black Death. Essential for historical fans.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 416 pages
• Publisher: St Martins Pr (October 1, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312193181
• ISBN-13: 978-0312193188
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.7 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,465,541 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Superb, November 26, 2001

By 

ilmk "ilmk" (UK) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Plague on Both Your Houses (Hardcover)

I have now read all of Susanna Gregory's medieval whodunnits (A masterly murder being the latest). They are excellent. I am sure there are many Ellis Peter's fans who will decry them as a poor imitation but they are simply the best out on the market. Admittedly it has taken Ms Gregory 4 novels to really get going and you can almost see the development in the writing skills as you read each one. What makes them good is that the whodunnit is secondary to the character development and microcosm of 14th century Cambridge. By the sixth novel in the series each character is well rounded (certainly in Michael's case!) and consistent with a huge variance of supporting actors. Whilst each murder is a separate mystery in itself the ramifications of each one reaches into the later books and indeed provides clues and reasoning behind the later actions of the Cambridge scholars and townspeople.
Read them...

11 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good Mystery, March 1, 2000

By 

S. Schwartz "romonko" (alberta canada) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: A Plague on Both Your Houses (Hardcover)

For those of us mourning the passing of Ellis Peters and the end of the Brother Cadfael mystery series, it is nice to know that others are writing in the genre. Ms. Gregory's writing isn't quite of the calibre of Ms. Peters, but certainly worth the effort. This is the first in the series of her mysteries set in the Dark Ages in England. The venue is Cambridge and her hero (Brother Matthew) is a monk as well as teacher and physician in the college. There are certainly a lot more killings than in Ms. Peters books, but the story is good and the characters real. I will be reading the rest of the series.

10 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars No competition for Ellis Peters, June 19, 2001

By 

C. Cooper (Calgary, Alberta Canada) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: A Plague on Both Your Houses (Hardcover)

When talking about medieval whodunnits comparisons with the wonderful Ellis Peters are inevitable. This series is not in fact quite as derivative as the other review suggests - the protagonist is not in fact a monk - Matthew Bartholomew is a physician and lecturer at the fledgling University of Cambridge. His sidekick, brother Michael is in fact a monk. Having said that, the combination of monks and medicine can only invite thoughts of Ellis Peters' 'Brother Cadfael' books, and this series comes off poorly in any such comparison. Whilst it seems to have been very thoroughly researched from an historical standpoint, and has a quite good storyline, the writing is far inferior to the 'Cadfael' books.

Ms Gregory seems to have had problems trying to decide what 'voice' to give her characters. This is always a problem with historical fiction - if you choose to use archaic language with lots of 'thees' and 'thous' it can feel clumsy and artificial and get in the way of the story. Most authors choose to use modern language, however anachronistic, so that we feel more immediacy and can concentrate on the story rather than the language. Ms. Gregory rather falls between the two stools, using reasonably modern language but eschewing the use of contractions ('I can not see the problem' rather than 'I can't see the problem') so that the whole thing seems rather stilted and unnatural.

I'm not sure whether it's this rather awkward writing style, but for whatever the reason, the characters just don't seem to come alive and the narrative plods a bit. To be honest, I really find it difficult to care who did what to whom and Matthew Bartholomew is so wishy-washy I don't think I'd go so far as to call him a 'hero'. If you're looking for a worthy successor to Ellis Peters, this isn't it. If you want a high quality historical whodunnit I'd far rather recommend Lindsey Davis's Falco series.

Having said all that, these really aren't dreadful books - they just suffer badly when compared to Ellis Peters.