Book Reviews: The Spanish Pearl and The Crown of Valencia by Catherine Friend

The Spanish Pearl. Catherine Friend. Bold Strokes Books, Inc. May 2007. First edition. 328 pages. ISBN 9781933110769.

The Crown of Valencia. Catherine Friend. Bold Strokes Books, Inc. November 2007. First edition. 283 pages. ISBN 1933110961.

Catherine Friend’s romantic duology is a fun, two-book romp through eleventh century Spain. The first book, The Spanish Pearl, heroine Kate Vincent falls through time, waking up almost a thousand years prior. She is rescued by a knight in shining armor. Any girl’s dream, right? Except Kate, in the present time, is a card-carrying lesbian. So she dislikes even more than most getting stuck in a Moorish harem.

Kate is desperate to get back to the present and the lover and child they were to adopt who she left behind. But the handsome Luis Navarra affects her deeply every time he looks at her, making Kate briefly doubt her orientation and her sanity. When circumstances force them to marry, the situation grows ever more complex with politics, war, and finding out that Luis is actually Elena.

Love sparks between these two characters, even across time. And the tables turn so it’s Kate in the end who must rescue Luis/Elena from the clutches of her enemy who threatens to expose her and violate her very being.

The Spanish Pearl is a great read and a fun way to explore history and the depths of the human heart.

The Crown of Valencia picks up where The Spanish Pearl left off, with Kate struggling to make it in 1085 A.D. with her lover, Elena, still disguised as a man and Kate’s husband. But things aren’t going well for Kate, with an average grade of D- for living in the early Middle Ages. Things go from bread baking disasters to worse when Anna, Kate’s ex-lover from the future arrives unexpectedly, the mistress of a major player in the battle of history. A history professor, Anna swears she’s merely there to observe. But worse, Anna has left Arturo, the child they were to have adopted, waiting for them in the orphanage. Riddled with guilt, Kate has no choice but to return and be a mother to this child who has won her over, even over her deep love for Elena.

Eight years later, Arturo is 14 and the future is coming apart. Books are changing, from 1096 onward, and Kate is the only one who knows what’s going on. She goes back in time, followed by her son Arturo, to set things right. But she finds the past just as complicated as the future. Her lover is against her and her ex-lover plans to use Arturo for her own machinations. Through a band of female archers, adolescent hormones, and deep jealousy, Kate must navigate the bloodied waters of history in order to make sure they all continue to exist.

Both books are easy summer reads, quick with wit, romance, adventure, and real treat whatever your orientation. Find Catherine Friend at www.catherinefriend.com.

Mowing

Mowing
by Robert Frost

There was never a sound beside the wood but one,
And that was my long scythe whispering to the ground.
What was it it whispered? I knew not well myself;
Perhaps it was something about the heat of the sun,
Something, perhaps, about the lack of sound—
And that was why it whispered and did not speak.
It was no dream of the gift of idle hours,
Or easy gold at the hand of fay or elf:
Anything more than the truth would have seemed too weak
To the earnest love that laid the swale in rows,
Not without feeble-pointed spikes of flowers
(Pale orchises), and scared a bright green snake.
The fact is the sweetest dream that labor knows.
My long scythe whispered and left the hay to make.

Kinda sums up my weekend, except for it being quiet, quaint, and bucolic. Cutting hay is dirty, hot, sun-burning business but we got it all knocked down Friday and Saturday.

Then Sunday, it rained.

Damn Michigan weather. But it should come off ok with the ten days of sun we’re supposed to get. It’s fun getting to run the equipment and everything, but damn I’d get bored runnin tractor all summer long. Driving around quits being novel after the first five hours on an open station tractor, I tell you what.

Been reading some good books lately, reviews to be forthcoming. The Pirate’s Heart by Catherine Friend is a rollicking good read, great summer book, as it chases four women on a treasure hunt. Pirates, treasure, a lost treasure map, a mad dash to find the treasure, and an illusive island, this pirate novel by a sheep-farmer in Minnesota is a feel-good adventure with a reference librarian superhero heroine. Good time.

The other I’m liking is Haunting Warrior by Erin Quinn. Rory MacGrath can only see the woman of his dreams in vision, but the death of his Irish grandmother takes Rory home where he trips back through time to find himself in the middle of a violent political upheaval and war. Thick with Irish mysticism and passion, this is a rich book with great characters, especially for a romance, which, let’s face it, isn’t always known for its depth and scope. Granted, that’s not the point, but it’s nice to see.

In the research vein, I’m reading Madams: Bawds and Brothel Keepers of London by Fergus Linnane. Sex and violence, what’s not great about that? :) New project set partially in eighteenth century Britain required a library day yesterday (oh darn) and, again, I came away with far too much reading. Oh well, will give me something to do when J and I drive to South Carolina next weekend.