SON OF DUST

Closer to The Unhurrying Chase than to The Man on a as young Fulcun Geroy, bastard of Montgaudri, battles his conscience -- as did Yves -- until he could bring into focus his love and his conviction of sin. For Fuleun loved the wife of another man, and thought to have killed him twice to free her. But Mauger of Fervacques seemed invulnerable and Alde, his wife, though her whole heart and soul were Fulcun's, found that she could not stay with him knowing her lord was alive. It is a tale not only of guilty love, but of 11th century struggles between suzersinties in and around Normandy. There is violence and hate and indifference to life there are standards of the Middle Ages that belie the days of chivalry -- there is a vivid sense of the life of the castles, the place of women, the loyalties and enmities between families. At one point, Fulcun, convinced almost wholly that his soul belongs to God, turns to the church, and under the quiet tutelage of Abbot Osbern finds relative peace of mind until -- once again-he hears that Alde, now widowed, has need of him, so he returns to what is left of his fief Caharel, and there rebuilds the ruined building, all that remained, reclaimed some of his fields, worked as a laborer- and looked like one, and waited for Alde to come to him. Even then, there was bitter struggle before they accepted the fact that God was Love and they claimed the right to be together. Not easy reading, but there is reward in the rounded picture of an era and a way of life.