WINE OF SATAN

An historical novel of immense scope in time, place and incident, this maintains momentum as well as color in its portrayal of several generations of the Norman rulers of South Italy in the late eleventh and early twelfth centuries. With a multiplicity and complexity of events which include love affairs and marriages and divorce, battles and orusades, victories and defeats, the focus of the novel is primarily directed at Bohemond De Hauteville, his ambitious and splendid career in Italy, around the northern edge of the Mediterranean, conquering as he went to Jerusalem. There is his love for Zoe Ridelle, who loved him too, but married Mihera Falloo when she realized that Bohemond's dreams and ambitions would always come first. Mihera leaves Zoe after a quarrel, and she and Bohemond live together happily for some years, until with the death of her daughter, she leaves him, and after misfortune, becomes a blind wandering singer. It is Mihera who finds her many years later, still singing songs of Bohemond. Up to par as an historical novel, for which there is always an audience.