Keeper of the Crystal Spring is a hybrid--part historical romance, part fantasy. The authors--sisters Naomi and Deborah Baltuck--have crammed the book with period detail, painting a vivid picture of England 20 years after the Norman Conquest. The magic is in the powers of the Goddess and her priestess, Sirona, who sees visions, knows herb lore and midwifery, and curses enemies. Sirona worships at the Crystal Spring, whose waters have miraculous healing properties, and is one of an old race the people call fairies.
Aldyth Lightfoot is a Saxon orphan, goddaughter to Sirona, and a healer. She believes herself destined to be a virgin priestess. Aldyth is also part of a network of guides and shelters for Saxon rebels. Armed resistance has collapsed, and the King's men are hunting down fugitives and their helpers. A fellow guide is Bedwyn, a handsome Saxon determined to marry her but now in mortal danger. His rival is the lonely, scholarly Gandulf Fitzgerald, heir to the harsh Norman Lord. Gandulf befriends the Saxons as he courts Aldyth, though Lord Ralf would marry him to a Norman heiress. Then a lay brother escorting two nuns to the abbey rescues Aldyth from assault; his secrets will change everything.
The cast in Keeper of the Crystal Spring is overcrowded, and a few too many subplots lengthen and complicate the narrative, but lovers of English folklore and history will enjoy this first novel. --Nona Vero
From Publishers Weekly
In 1067, a sensitive young boy named Gandulf watches the army of his cruel father, the Norman baron Lord Ralf fitzGerald, destroy the home of the Saxon lord Aethelstan in Sceapterbyrig, a fictional town modeled on medieval Shaftesbury in southwestern England. He sees a straw basket secretly lowered over the castle wall to waiting hands and later hears a Saxon priest swear to the Normans that Aethelstan had only one heir, an infant girl, and she has died. This turns out not to be true. Twenty years later, the love triangle of beautiful Aldyth, godchild of the crone Sirona, the village healer and wisewoman, Gandulf, who has been educated in a monastery, and Bedwyn, a handsome Saxon outlaw, begins. Aldyth has been raised in the healing arts and to serve the goddess of the Crystal Spring, the only water source in a nearby village, and expects to dedicate her life to the Great Mother. Fate, however, has other plans. In this ambitious first novel, the authors, who are sisters, provide accurate historical background of Norman-Saxon conflicts in the era immediately following the Battle of Hastings. They also convey interesting material about herbal and medieval folklore. Unfortunately, these digressions burden the narrative early, as does a seemingly unending parade of insufficiently introduced characters. There is an excess of florid prose, and transitions are often awkward. The plot is unlikely (the crone Sirona dangles by her hands from a ledge for hours until Aldyth, recently rescued from a dungeon pit herself, and a young orphan gallop to save her). But readers will probably also hang on as the Baltucks eventually bring their love story to a satisfactory finish. Doubleday Book Club selection.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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