THE TRAITOR QUEEN
By
The author has not lived up to the high level of The Sacred Jewel (1961, p. 614, J-214), her historical novel focused on the Druids.. The atmosphere and sense of ancient Greece are here; the elaborate life at the palace of Minos in Crete is etched out in detail as the story of Thalamika, the queen's love-stricken, danger-plagued handmaiden, unfolds. Character development suffers because the author has made the people so ancient, so Greek, that they nearly slip to the two dimensional level, revealing their emotions in only black or white.