HEART'S CONQUEST

Too often young romance with historical trappings falls between two stools:- the historical and period material is important, well researched, competently handled; the romance is superficial and contrived. This is no exception. Gladys Malvern has done her research into the period of the Norman Conquest of England well. One can sense the all-pervading mood of fear, can accept the portrait of the age, the details of life is feudal England, the wave of devastation that spread over the land with reprisals against those who resisted the Norman. But the central story of Alicia, young, beautiful, assured in her acceptance of her right to her place -- and the part she played in helping bring about the resistance of Yorkshire- somehow never seems to cut below the surface. Good story telling- and the tenuous thread of romance with the hated Norman will capture the teen age reader- but Alicia remains a stock figure and her Gilbert a very perfect knight.