Mist Over the Water

December 14, 2009
Norman plans to build a cathedral on the Isle of Ely in East Anglia lead to trouble in Clare’s less than compelling second medieval historical featuring apprentice healer Lassair (after 2009’s Out of the Dawn Light
). When unknown assailants attack Lassair’s cousin Morcar while he’s fishing for eels one night, they leave him close to death. With Lassair’s teacher otherwise engaged, she must try to save Morcar’s life. After she succeeds in stabilizing her patient, 16-year-old Lassair turns her attention to identifying the men responsible for the assault and their motives. She soon learns that the culprits, who may be connected with a local monastery, are still looking to tie up loose ends by eliminating Morcar—and that they’re prepared to kill her as well. Clare (the pseudonym for British author Elizabeth Harris) has done a better job of creating interesting lead characters and settings in her Hawkenlye series (The Joys of My Life
, etc.).

January 1, 2010
A young medieval healer becomes involved in a dangerous political scheme.

Lassair lives with and learns from her aunt Edild, a healer and herbalist of prodigious skill who sends Lassair to tend to her cousin Morcar, attacked and left for dead on Ely Island in the waterlogged Fen area of East Anglia. Accompanied by her friend Sibert, who lives with his mother and uncle Hypre, a sorcerer, she travels to Ely. The island is a-bustle with men building a huge new Norman abbey—a job that involves destroying the Saxon chapel of Saint Elfreda. Lassair saves Morcar, but the murder of several men who looked and dressed like him makes it clear that her cousin knows a deadly secret, presumably connected to his glimpse of the abbey's monks roughing up a pale lad. Lassair has Sibert take Morcar to safety while she meets and learns more about the simple young man. Sibert, whose father died after a battle at Ely, has his own reasons for returning. Between them they discover dangerous and heartbreaking secrets from the past. At length Lassair meets an attractive man who also seeks the pale boy, a pawn in a dangerous game that could lead to death for them all.

The second in the Aelf Fen series (Out of the Dawn Light, 2009) is a worthy continuation of the entrancing story of Lassair, whose talents are both practical and mystical.

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February 1, 2010
The son of William the Conqueror is building an impressive cathedral on Ely Island. While fishing for eels, Morcar, cousin of apprentice healer Lassair, is horribly injured, and Lassair goes to tend him. What appeared to be an accident turns out to be an attempt on Morcar's life. VERDICT In this second entry in her Aelf Fen Norman series (after "Out of the Dawn Light"), Clare doles out enticing clues to keep the reader turning the pages. She also knows her medieval medicine, which should delight all fans of Ellis Peters and Susanna Gregory. [See Prepub Mystery, "LJ" 10/1/09.]

Copyright 2010 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from December 1, 2009
Another outstanding entry in Clares engaging Aelf Fen series, set during the Norman period in British history. Sixteen-year-old Lassair, an accomplished healer, is sent to Ely Island to nurse her cousin, Morcar, after he is viciously attacked. Because its too dangerous for Lassair to travel on her own, she is accompanied by Sibert, a young man she likes most of the time. But Sibert has another motive for going to Ely: his father died there under mysterious circumstances before Sibert was born, and Sibert wants to find out what really happened. But his mission becomes secondary when Lassair discovers from Morcar that he may have been attacked because he witnessed a pale, white-haired youth being pulled into the Ely monastery, apparently against his will. What Lassair cant understand is why such a minor incident should provoke such a violent attack, and she determines to seek out the odd-looking young man, learn his story, and free him if hes being held captive. What she finds, however, is a terrible secret dating back decades, a secret that could have deadly consequences. This page-turning historical thriller from one of Britains most talented popular-fiction authors ticks all the boxes with a riveting plot; fascinating period detail; engaging characters; and liberal doses of romance, magic, and mysticism. Recommend across genres to fans of historical mysteries and romances.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)