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The Gallows Curse
Set in the reign of King John, when the whole of England was under sentence of excommunication (among other issues, King John wouldn't accept the Pope's choice of Archbishop). Can you imagine the chaos - all the churches closed, King John in retaliation arresting every priest who hadn't fled and the people terrified of dying in sin without the last rites? No burials were permitted on consecrated land, no marriages were conducted, no babies baptized. But I don't want to reveal much more, except to say the plot involves people-trafficking, murder and, oh yes... a very feisty dwarf and a eunuch with a hunger for revenge.
352 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2011
77 people are currently reading
2837 people want to read
About the author
Karen Maitland
28 books1,193 followersKaren Maitland, who also writes as KJ Maitland, has a doctorate in psycholinguists and lives in the beautiful county of Devon, close to Dartmoor where Agatha Christie had her writing retreat and Sir Arthur Colon Doyle wrote 'The Hound of the Baskervilles', one of Karen’s favourite childhood books.
Writing as KJ Maitland, 'A Plague of Serpents,' the final historical thriller in her Jacobean quartet, is now out in pb. Set in the aftermath of the infamous Gunpowder Plot of 1605, Daniel Pursglove is ordered to infiltrate the 'Serpents', a desperate band of Catholics plotting the death of the King, or face his own execution. The 1st book in the series -'The Drowned City', the 2nd - 'Traitor in the Ice', and the 3rd - 'Rivers of Treason', are all published by Headline.
Her first stand alone medieval thriller was 'Company of Liars', was set at the time of the Black Death in 1348. This was followed by The Owl Killers', 'The Gallows Curse', 'Falcons of Fire and Ice', 'The Vanishing Witch', 'The Raven's Head,' 'The Plague Charmer' and 'A Gathering of Ghosts', Her medieval novels are written under the name of Karen Maitland and are published by Penguin and Headline.
Karen is also one of six historical crime writers known as the Medieval Murderers – Philip Gooden, Susannah Gregory, Michael Jecks, Bernard Knight and Ian Morson – who together write joint murder-mystery novel, including 'The Sacred Stone', 'Hill of Bones' and 'The First Murder', 'The False Virgin' and 'The Deadliest Sin' published by Simon & Schuster.
Writing as KJ Maitland, 'A Plague of Serpents,' the final historical thriller in her Jacobean quartet, is now out in pb. Set in the aftermath of the infamous Gunpowder Plot of 1605, Daniel Pursglove is ordered to infiltrate the 'Serpents', a desperate band of Catholics plotting the death of the King, or face his own execution. The 1st book in the series -'The Drowned City', the 2nd - 'Traitor in the Ice', and the 3rd - 'Rivers of Treason', are all published by Headline.
Her first stand alone medieval thriller was 'Company of Liars', was set at the time of the Black Death in 1348. This was followed by The Owl Killers', 'The Gallows Curse', 'Falcons of Fire and Ice', 'The Vanishing Witch', 'The Raven's Head,' 'The Plague Charmer' and 'A Gathering of Ghosts', Her medieval novels are written under the name of Karen Maitland and are published by Penguin and Headline.
Karen is also one of six historical crime writers known as the Medieval Murderers – Philip Gooden, Susannah Gregory, Michael Jecks, Bernard Knight and Ian Morson – who together write joint murder-mystery novel, including 'The Sacred Stone', 'Hill of Bones' and 'The First Murder', 'The False Virgin' and 'The Deadliest Sin' published by Simon & Schuster.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 241 reviews
October 2, 2018
this is probably the best book i have ever read that is narrated entirely by a mandrake.
let's take a moment to celebrate the mandrake, shall we? a humanlike plant brought to life by the spilled semen of hanged men which screams when it is pulled from the ground, but will continue to live and grant you magical abilities if you treat it right? coolest thing ever, and a childhood fascination of mine - i always wanted one for a pet, but noooooo, we had to have a dog. damn traditional family...
this book takes place during the interdict of king john in 1210, which suspended all services of the church: baptism, marriage, holy unction, last rites, because of his dispute with the pope over archbishop-appointment. which is a shitty thing to do to a medieval people whose lives were so dependent upon their religious rituals, yeah?
this interdict affects all the characters in the book, but the focus is primarily upon elena, a young villein in the service of lady anne, and rafaele/raffe, a eunuch also in lady anne's service, who is trying to absolve the sins of his deceased friend and lady anne's son, sir gerard.
so, elena is in love with fellow-villein athan, and would have married him if she had been able to (thanks a lot, king john...) but even without the church-sanctioned ceremony, she considers herself to be his, and they have one night of intercourse, during which she becomes pregnant. which is what god does to you when you have sex without marriage. rafaele, thinking she is a virgin and therefore cannot be harmed by the practice, tricks her into becoming a sin-eater for sir gerard, who has died unshriven in battle with some serious sins on his soul.
of course, she is not, in fact, a virgin, so bad things happen.
lots and lots of bad things.
it is way too complicated and twisty to go into in an eensy little book report,but there will be a birth, and accusations and murder and the gallows and a brothel and a dwarf and runaway priests and a liquefying body and a lion and a multiple-amputee and a werecat and a generations-old revenge plot and murder. murder. murder.
and all of this is overseen by the mandrake, cause of so much of the awful.
but the book is really very good.
the criminal justice system of medieval times was kind of horrifying, i'm sure you know. in my freshman year of undergrad, i took an anthropology course about witchcraft, which was amazing.
an aside!! when i was looking online for a picture of my professor for that course, the only one i could find was this doodle:
from this genius-of-a-concept, but not very well-maintained site:
http://nyuprofs.tumblr.com/
which makes me wish i could find my notebooks from my own nyu days, because i had some fabulous prof-doodles.
also, beidelman never once wore a tie to any of my classes. just these tight-over-little-potbelly t-shirts with black cats and other witchy stuff on them, even though his lectures were 100% serious. and he always appeared hungover, but in an energetic, wild-haired way, not all sluggish and uninterested. and he wrote this book: Moral Imagination in Kaguru Modes of Thought, which i am apparently one of only two people to ever have rated on here. but it was a good book, and it was definitely my favorite class freshman year, and i got an a+. so there.
but witchcraft was such a tricky and formless crime. the acceptable proofs of guilt were not particularly compelling. basically, if you were a woman, and you had any kind of power or influence or wealth, you were probably going to be accused of witchcraft sooner or later. sorry.
As with mandrakes, those women with gifts that men cannot control, men fashion into witches and demons, that they might destroy them.
and the punishments were not all healthy new england burnings or drownings - the germans got particularly creative.
not really sure why i went off on a witchcraft tangent there, since the "serious" witch hunts in europe didn't start until centuries later, except that this book has a lot of witchy magic in it, resulting from both the repercussions of the sin-eating ritual, the mandrake itself, and the influence of a couple of "cunning women" who are using elena for their own purposes just as rafaele used her for his. there are accusations of witchcraft, of course, but i think i might have overemphasized it in my nostalgia over dear old beidelman's course.
i am blizzard-addled.
but the witch hunts were very a gendered phenomenon, and this book is also very focused on gender, from the powerlessness of a woman of the villein class, to raffe's surgically removed manhood, to the sexual currency in the brothel where elena is forced into prostitution. (yeah,man, i told you it was complicated, sheesh.)
but the madame of the brothel is a phenomenal character - a dwarf with a snake-preoccupation who is super tough and calculating, but you know you are going to unearth her secret compassionate center. eventually.
No girl in this stew is a whore, my darling, unless she chooses to be one. Every woman here sells what talents she has, and that makes her an artist, a merchant of goods. She does no more or less than a scribe, a musician, or a trader in holy relics. Only a woman who lets a man take her because she is afraid of him, or of making her own way in the world, makes herself a slave and a whore. More whores have graced the noble marriage beds of Europe than ever worked in brothels.
which i kind of love, and in this context, in this situation, sex has been elevated to an art. in her brothel, at least, not so much in the elena-and-athan in the barn episode. but elena will learn.
i think this review got away from me again. sorry about that. once again, blair has beaten me to a book, and her review is leaps and bounds above mine, so go read that instead.
also, blair, if you are here
come to my blog!
let's take a moment to celebrate the mandrake, shall we? a humanlike plant brought to life by the spilled semen of hanged men which screams when it is pulled from the ground, but will continue to live and grant you magical abilities if you treat it right? coolest thing ever, and a childhood fascination of mine - i always wanted one for a pet, but noooooo, we had to have a dog. damn traditional family...
this book takes place during the interdict of king john in 1210, which suspended all services of the church: baptism, marriage, holy unction, last rites, because of his dispute with the pope over archbishop-appointment. which is a shitty thing to do to a medieval people whose lives were so dependent upon their religious rituals, yeah?
this interdict affects all the characters in the book, but the focus is primarily upon elena, a young villein in the service of lady anne, and rafaele/raffe, a eunuch also in lady anne's service, who is trying to absolve the sins of his deceased friend and lady anne's son, sir gerard.
so, elena is in love with fellow-villein athan, and would have married him if she had been able to (thanks a lot, king john...) but even without the church-sanctioned ceremony, she considers herself to be his, and they have one night of intercourse, during which she becomes pregnant. which is what god does to you when you have sex without marriage. rafaele, thinking she is a virgin and therefore cannot be harmed by the practice, tricks her into becoming a sin-eater for sir gerard, who has died unshriven in battle with some serious sins on his soul.
of course, she is not, in fact, a virgin, so bad things happen.
lots and lots of bad things.
it is way too complicated and twisty to go into in an eensy little book report,but there will be a birth, and accusations and murder and the gallows and a brothel and a dwarf and runaway priests and a liquefying body and a lion and a multiple-amputee and a werecat and a generations-old revenge plot and murder. murder. murder.
and all of this is overseen by the mandrake, cause of so much of the awful.
but the book is really very good.
the criminal justice system of medieval times was kind of horrifying, i'm sure you know. in my freshman year of undergrad, i took an anthropology course about witchcraft, which was amazing.
an aside!! when i was looking online for a picture of my professor for that course, the only one i could find was this doodle:
from this genius-of-a-concept, but not very well-maintained site:
http://nyuprofs.tumblr.com/
which makes me wish i could find my notebooks from my own nyu days, because i had some fabulous prof-doodles.
also, beidelman never once wore a tie to any of my classes. just these tight-over-little-potbelly t-shirts with black cats and other witchy stuff on them, even though his lectures were 100% serious. and he always appeared hungover, but in an energetic, wild-haired way, not all sluggish and uninterested. and he wrote this book: Moral Imagination in Kaguru Modes of Thought, which i am apparently one of only two people to ever have rated on here. but it was a good book, and it was definitely my favorite class freshman year, and i got an a+. so there.
but witchcraft was such a tricky and formless crime. the acceptable proofs of guilt were not particularly compelling. basically, if you were a woman, and you had any kind of power or influence or wealth, you were probably going to be accused of witchcraft sooner or later. sorry.
As with mandrakes, those women with gifts that men cannot control, men fashion into witches and demons, that they might destroy them.
and the punishments were not all healthy new england burnings or drownings - the germans got particularly creative.
not really sure why i went off on a witchcraft tangent there, since the "serious" witch hunts in europe didn't start until centuries later, except that this book has a lot of witchy magic in it, resulting from both the repercussions of the sin-eating ritual, the mandrake itself, and the influence of a couple of "cunning women" who are using elena for their own purposes just as rafaele used her for his. there are accusations of witchcraft, of course, but i think i might have overemphasized it in my nostalgia over dear old beidelman's course.
i am blizzard-addled.
but the witch hunts were very a gendered phenomenon, and this book is also very focused on gender, from the powerlessness of a woman of the villein class, to raffe's surgically removed manhood, to the sexual currency in the brothel where elena is forced into prostitution. (yeah,man, i told you it was complicated, sheesh.)
but the madame of the brothel is a phenomenal character - a dwarf with a snake-preoccupation who is super tough and calculating, but you know you are going to unearth her secret compassionate center. eventually.
No girl in this stew is a whore, my darling, unless she chooses to be one. Every woman here sells what talents she has, and that makes her an artist, a merchant of goods. She does no more or less than a scribe, a musician, or a trader in holy relics. Only a woman who lets a man take her because she is afraid of him, or of making her own way in the world, makes herself a slave and a whore. More whores have graced the noble marriage beds of Europe than ever worked in brothels.
which i kind of love, and in this context, in this situation, sex has been elevated to an art. in her brothel, at least, not so much in the elena-and-athan in the barn episode. but elena will learn.
i think this review got away from me again. sorry about that. once again, blair has beaten me to a book, and her review is leaps and bounds above mine, so go read that instead.
also, blair, if you are here
come to my blog!
January 28, 2013
This was a rollicking, medieval soap opera that I thoroughly enjoyed.
A warning to you menfolk - while the book is crammed with strong female characters, the guys tend to be either conniving bastards or lily-livered wusses who do everything Mommy tells them...even if it's abstaining from sex.
My favorite exchange occurs when a crusty old battle-ax is fearful that some of the king's men may have their way with her. She is told, rather impolitely, by one "gentleman," "You can sleep soundly, mistress. There's not a man alive who wouldn't sooner bed his own horse than try your virtue."
There was also this notable passage that shows how little has changed over the last several centuries, and that we are still fearful and superstitious people who do nasty things to one another:
Mortals are strange creatures; they cling to life even when that life is nothing but pain and misery, yet they will throw away their lives for a word, an idea, even a flag. Wolves piss to mark their territory. Smell the stench of another pack and wolves will quietly slink away. Why risk a fight when it might maim or kill you? But humans will slash and slaughter in their thousands to plant their little piece of cloth on a hill or hang it from a battlement.
A warning to you menfolk - while the book is crammed with strong female characters, the guys tend to be either conniving bastards or lily-livered wusses who do everything Mommy tells them...even if it's abstaining from sex.
My favorite exchange occurs when a crusty old battle-ax is fearful that some of the king's men may have their way with her. She is told, rather impolitely, by one "gentleman," "You can sleep soundly, mistress. There's not a man alive who wouldn't sooner bed his own horse than try your virtue."
There was also this notable passage that shows how little has changed over the last several centuries, and that we are still fearful and superstitious people who do nasty things to one another:
Mortals are strange creatures; they cling to life even when that life is nothing but pain and misery, yet they will throw away their lives for a word, an idea, even a flag. Wolves piss to mark their territory. Smell the stench of another pack and wolves will quietly slink away. Why risk a fight when it might maim or kill you? But humans will slash and slaughter in their thousands to plant their little piece of cloth on a hill or hang it from a battlement.
November 20, 2014
Like Karen Maitland's other two books, Company of Liars and The Owl Killers (both great, by the way), this is a complex, labyrinthine mystery set in medieval England. The Interdict of 1208 forms the background for the plot, which concerns two main characters. The first is Elena, a 15-year-old serving girl who becomes a runaway, and later finds herself tricked into prostitution, after she's accused of killing her own baby. The second is Raffaelle, a tortured, revenge-hungry steward who is forced out of his manor by the brothers he holds responsible for his own agonies during the Crusades, as well as those of his late best friend and master Gerard. There are twists, turns and deaths galore as Raffaelle and Elena, both separately and together, attempt to outwit the treacherous Osborn and Hugh, making plenty of friends and enemies along the way.
Having enjoyed the author's previous novels so much, I expected a lot from The Gallows Curse, and it didn't disappoint. The characters are wonderful. Elena seems to be a bit of a cliché at first (innocent, beautiful young girl who has just about every tragedy possible thrown at her and survives despite the odds) but I found myself warming to her more and more as the story went on. As you see the horror and loneliness of life as a runaway villein and an unwilling whore through Elena's eyes, you end up rooting for her to make it through and get revenge on her tormentors. In Raffaelle, meanwhile, Maitland has created a fascinating, flawed, contradictory antihero and probably my favourite character of all the books I've read recently. He's simultaneously repulsive and entrancing, hateful and heroic. He does some awful and some great things; he pays dearly for his sins and for attempting to selflessly help others, but it's impossible to ignore the fact that many of his actions are motivated purely by his lust for Elena. Yet I ended up feeling more sympathy for the character than I would had he been unbelievably 'perfect'.
The glimpses into the characters' pasts and memories are fantastic, and really make the whole story feel fleshed out. The plot has everything - violent deaths, sexual deviance, witchcraft, spying/treason, prophetic dreams, a collection of caged exotic animals, shedloads of dark secrets and plenty of daring escapes, all against the backdrop of a 13th-century England depicted so vividly you can almost taste it. I love the way Maitland works elements of the supernatural into the plot without fanfare, so seamlessly you can easily believe magical beings and powerful witches really existed as part of everyday life back in medieval times (the story is part-narrated by a mandrake, and one of many subplots involves a pair of cunning women with an ancient grudge). If there are flaws, they're to do with repetition in the language. The characters utter the same curses over and over again (God's blood, Satan's arse etc...), and the words 'stench' and 'stink' are repeated way too much - we get it, the Middle Ages weren't particularly fragrant. Overall, however, such minor flaws didn't do much to dent my enjoyment of the book as a whole.
And then... the ending. I feel so conflicted by the ending!
While at first I missed certain elements from Maitland's other books - the variety of first-person narrators from The Owl Killers, the wide cast of eccentric characters from Company of Liars - I think this new tale may be her best yet. I was riveted throughout the book, and upon finishing it my instinct was to jump right back to the beginning and start all over again. As ever, I would recommend Maitland's novels to anyone interested in historical fiction; as well as being compelling and obviously very well-researched, they're also darkly funny, full of surprises and undeniably entertaining.
Having enjoyed the author's previous novels so much, I expected a lot from The Gallows Curse, and it didn't disappoint. The characters are wonderful. Elena seems to be a bit of a cliché at first (innocent, beautiful young girl who has just about every tragedy possible thrown at her and survives despite the odds) but I found myself warming to her more and more as the story went on. As you see the horror and loneliness of life as a runaway villein and an unwilling whore through Elena's eyes, you end up rooting for her to make it through and get revenge on her tormentors. In Raffaelle, meanwhile, Maitland has created a fascinating, flawed, contradictory antihero and probably my favourite character of all the books I've read recently. He's simultaneously repulsive and entrancing, hateful and heroic. He does some awful and some great things; he pays dearly for his sins and for attempting to selflessly help others, but it's impossible to ignore the fact that many of his actions are motivated purely by his lust for Elena. Yet I ended up feeling more sympathy for the character than I would had he been unbelievably 'perfect'.
The glimpses into the characters' pasts and memories are fantastic, and really make the whole story feel fleshed out. The plot has everything - violent deaths, sexual deviance, witchcraft, spying/treason, prophetic dreams, a collection of caged exotic animals, shedloads of dark secrets and plenty of daring escapes, all against the backdrop of a 13th-century England depicted so vividly you can almost taste it. I love the way Maitland works elements of the supernatural into the plot without fanfare, so seamlessly you can easily believe magical beings and powerful witches really existed as part of everyday life back in medieval times (the story is part-narrated by a mandrake, and one of many subplots involves a pair of cunning women with an ancient grudge). If there are flaws, they're to do with repetition in the language. The characters utter the same curses over and over again (God's blood, Satan's arse etc...), and the words 'stench' and 'stink' are repeated way too much - we get it, the Middle Ages weren't particularly fragrant. Overall, however, such minor flaws didn't do much to dent my enjoyment of the book as a whole.
And then... the ending. I feel so conflicted by the ending!
While at first I missed certain elements from Maitland's other books - the variety of first-person narrators from The Owl Killers, the wide cast of eccentric characters from Company of Liars - I think this new tale may be her best yet. I was riveted throughout the book, and upon finishing it my instinct was to jump right back to the beginning and start all over again. As ever, I would recommend Maitland's novels to anyone interested in historical fiction; as well as being compelling and obviously very well-researched, they're also darkly funny, full of surprises and undeniably entertaining.
January 15, 2022
Maitland may be the only kid-lit writer out there who can give a talking mandrake root a fitting and plausible voice. (Sinister.)
June 9, 2012
I wasn't as riveted by The Gallows Curse as I was by Karen Maitland's first book, Company of Liars. Part of that was the fact that I've been writing essays, and I haven't had a gallstone attack that could just keep me up all night with nothing to do but read! And part of it is my reluctance to end up with no more of her stuff to read...
Like Company of Liars, it's somewhat slow paced, based on a build up of tension that really works for me and might infuriate other readers. I like Karen Maitland's interesting conceits of narration, and her way of ending stories -- it might get a bit annoying if every book has this kind of sting in the tail, because it'll stop being surprising, but so far I've enjoyed both of them. The Gallows Curse had a few more loose ends than Company of Liars, I think, and I didn't care about the characters as much (though Raffe is a truly awesome anti-hero), but I still liked it a lot.
Maitland's range as a writer is quite exciting: I've got The Owl Killers to read, and then I look forward to reading her future works. She does her historical research well, and weaves in fascinating supernatural threads, and still has talent left over for a deft touch with characters.
Like Company of Liars, it's somewhat slow paced, based on a build up of tension that really works for me and might infuriate other readers. I like Karen Maitland's interesting conceits of narration, and her way of ending stories -- it might get a bit annoying if every book has this kind of sting in the tail, because it'll stop being surprising, but so far I've enjoyed both of them. The Gallows Curse had a few more loose ends than Company of Liars, I think, and I didn't care about the characters as much (though Raffe is a truly awesome anti-hero), but I still liked it a lot.
Maitland's range as a writer is quite exciting: I've got The Owl Killers to read, and then I look forward to reading her future works. She does her historical research well, and weaves in fascinating supernatural threads, and still has talent left over for a deft touch with characters.
May 10, 2019
4.25 stars for Maitland, Mistress of the medieval. At the beginning of each chapter she gives us a taste of her knowledge of 13th century superstitions as it pertains to trees: “For the ash is a sacred tree and the three weird sisters of fate–past, present and future–water the ash so that it will never die. And, at the roots of the ash tree lie three wells–remembrance, rebirth and destruction. And the deepest well of them all is destruction.”
I enjoyed this less than the other 3 I’ve read by her but still superb for atmosphere, characters personal favorite? Mother Margot. , here she is introduced: “The woman was a dwarf, no more than three feet high, with a massive head, so that it looked as if the head of a giant had been placed on the body of an infant. She was dressed in a long, loose scarlet robe, which though stained and a little threadbare, must once have been as costly as any gown of Lady Anne’s. Heavy gold bracelets squeezed around the bulging muscles of Ma’s arms. Her oiled black hair was coiled up like a snake on top of her head and fastened with long gold pins topped with jewels that glowed blood-red in the candlelight. Ma’s yellow-green eyes, bulging like a frog’s, ran an appraising glance up and down...”
Nothing ever turns out like you think in a Maitland.
I enjoyed this less than the other 3 I’ve read by her but still superb for atmosphere, characters personal favorite? Mother Margot. , here she is introduced: “The woman was a dwarf, no more than three feet high, with a massive head, so that it looked as if the head of a giant had been placed on the body of an infant. She was dressed in a long, loose scarlet robe, which though stained and a little threadbare, must once have been as costly as any gown of Lady Anne’s. Heavy gold bracelets squeezed around the bulging muscles of Ma’s arms. Her oiled black hair was coiled up like a snake on top of her head and fastened with long gold pins topped with jewels that glowed blood-red in the candlelight. Ma’s yellow-green eyes, bulging like a frog’s, ran an appraising glance up and down...”
Nothing ever turns out like you think in a Maitland.
October 29, 2012
I started out liking this for the writing style, but I ended up disliking it for the plot and the characters. The plot was overcooked. We had the gallows curse of the title, plus the inderdict (churches were closed by the Pope during the time this book was set, so no-one could be baptised , married buried etc) with resulting unrest and plots against the king. Added to that were hideous deeds done during the crusades, plus a castrato who was there just to add period colour as far as I could see. If that wasn't enough, there were "secrets" hinted at throughout the book. Did I write "hint"? It was more like being beaten around the head with them, and they were mostly pretty obvious anyway.
Then there were the characters. Elena was the main female character, who seemed to have a death-wish. If it was possible for her to say or do something to put her into danger, she did it without hesitation and then stood around feeling sorry for herself while other people rescued her. I began to wish they wouldn't. Next we have Raffe. He loved Elena for her purity and innocence, so he arranged for her to be condemned to eternal damnation for something which someone else had done and then he hid her in a brothel where she would have to turn the occasional trick to stay alive. There was a feeble effort at justifying this, but one of the characters in the book demolished that, so I didn't have to. Finally, there was Lady Anne, the ageing, frail lady of the manor and part-time serial killer of strong trained soldiers. Actually I quite liked her and tried hard to suspend my disbelief that someone as frail as her could carry out the stranglings and stabbings that she was credited with, but unfortunately it really was too ridiculous for words.
Then there were the characters. Elena was the main female character, who seemed to have a death-wish. If it was possible for her to say or do something to put her into danger, she did it without hesitation and then stood around feeling sorry for herself while other people rescued her. I began to wish they wouldn't. Next we have Raffe. He loved Elena for her purity and innocence, so he arranged for her to be condemned to eternal damnation for something which someone else had done and then he hid her in a brothel where she would have to turn the occasional trick to stay alive. There was a feeble effort at justifying this, but one of the characters in the book demolished that, so I didn't have to. Finally, there was Lady Anne, the ageing, frail lady of the manor and part-time serial killer of strong trained soldiers. Actually I quite liked her and tried hard to suspend my disbelief that someone as frail as her could carry out the stranglings and stabbings that she was credited with, but unfortunately it really was too ridiculous for words.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
March 6, 2014
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 4, 2021
Read this book in 2012, and its a standalone book set in the time of the reign of King John.
This tale is set in the year AD 1210, the High Middle Ages, and with the vengeful King John on the throne.
When this King seizes control of the Church, nobody is safe anymore, from leaving corpses in unconsecrated ground to babies unbaptized in their cradles, and people terrified of dying in sin.
In this time of terror and death in the village of Gastmere, a young woman servant called Elena, is dragged into a conspiracy to absolve the lord of the manor.
More and more her conscious is plaguing her, and when she visits a cunning woman, she's damned for that cunning woman sees her as an easy victim to fulfil an ancient curse conjured at the gallows.
Elena tries to flee, after feeling haunted by that curse and threatened with death with a murder she didn't commit, leaving her nightmare still persistent in her thoughts and feelings.
What is to follow is a tremendous psychological and supernatural adventure, and that is brought to us by the author in a most wonderful fashion, and that's why I like to call this book: "A Superb Gallows Curse"!
This tale is set in the year AD 1210, the High Middle Ages, and with the vengeful King John on the throne.
When this King seizes control of the Church, nobody is safe anymore, from leaving corpses in unconsecrated ground to babies unbaptized in their cradles, and people terrified of dying in sin.
In this time of terror and death in the village of Gastmere, a young woman servant called Elena, is dragged into a conspiracy to absolve the lord of the manor.
More and more her conscious is plaguing her, and when she visits a cunning woman, she's damned for that cunning woman sees her as an easy victim to fulfil an ancient curse conjured at the gallows.
Elena tries to flee, after feeling haunted by that curse and threatened with death with a murder she didn't commit, leaving her nightmare still persistent in her thoughts and feelings.
What is to follow is a tremendous psychological and supernatural adventure, and that is brought to us by the author in a most wonderful fashion, and that's why I like to call this book: "A Superb Gallows Curse"!
April 16, 2011
Novelist Karen Maitland puts the dark into the Dark Ages. In her first two novels Company of Liars and The Owl Killers she took us into the seamy side of the 1300's. No knights and pageantry for Ms. Maitland. No martyrs or future Popes. No farm boys turned empire builders or daughters of the squire scheming to marry up. Her heroes and heroines are the unwashed, the common folk of the period struggling legally and illegally if necessary to survive and all too susceptible to superstition and the manipulations of those in a position to do them a little bit of good. It's all a little twisty as well as dark and all the more engaging for that. Karen Maitland writes historical fiction that doesn't need royalty to fascinate.
Maitland's new novel, The Gallows Curse has a 13th century setting that has a soul satisfying mystery at its core. The background for the storyline is the six year long battle between England's' King John and Pope Innocent the III. In 1207 the Pope selected a new Archbishop of Canterbury. King John wasn't pleased by the choice so he refused to let the Archbishop enter England and then appropeated some Church lands. The Pope in turn excommunicated John and put all of England under an interdict. Essentially an interdict means that you are not allowed to recieve any Church rites: baptism, marriage, last rites, etc. Ultimately this treatment from the Church was one of the straws that broke the nobilities backs and in 1211 they forced King John to sign the Magna Carta.
Picture if you will a 13th century European country shunned by Rome. At this moment in time the Catholic Church probably had more influence and power over the average European citizen than any monarch. It was certainly more of a daily presence in the lives of the citizenry than any King would be. The absence of the Church created a perfect storm for opportunists willing to use superstition, intimidation and hell fire for their own gain. The Church was far from perfect but sometimes life is easier with the Devil you know.
In The Gallows Curse we get to wallow in 500+ pages of schemers, prophecy, secrets, treachery, history, invention and Gothic melodrama. In the middle of this entertaining mix is Elena a fifteen year old maidservant at Gastmere Manor. At first Elena feels lucky to have been given the position at Gastmere but after gaining the attention of the young lord of the manor maybe Elena's luck isn't so good after all. Soon Elena is pregnant and pursued for a crime she didn't commit. She is helped by a mysterious local woman who sees Elena's troubles as her chance to settle old scores and Raffaele, steward of the manor. Raffaele is an older man consumed by his own crimes. He is convinced that there is nothing he can do to make up for the past. That belief in his own evil brings an edge to his willingness to aid Elena, does he have his own agenda?
Maitland's bag of tricks gets a workout as she plays out Elena's and Raffaele's stories against an England that has been silenced by the Church. This is where historical events butt up against everyday lives. Betrayal, superstition, curses, fear, ignorance and suspicion fester away among the populace in The Gallows Curse. Surrounding the plotline and the tensions in the novel is the filthy, thick with foreboding atmosphere Maitland has layered into the book. Every twist of the tale brings Elena further away from safety and the reader deeper into a brutal, every day could be your last time period.
So far there is no pub date for a U.S. edition of The Gallows Curse. Her other two novels were published over here so this might just me a matter of time. My edition came from the U.K.
Maitland's new novel, The Gallows Curse has a 13th century setting that has a soul satisfying mystery at its core. The background for the storyline is the six year long battle between England's' King John and Pope Innocent the III. In 1207 the Pope selected a new Archbishop of Canterbury. King John wasn't pleased by the choice so he refused to let the Archbishop enter England and then appropeated some Church lands. The Pope in turn excommunicated John and put all of England under an interdict. Essentially an interdict means that you are not allowed to recieve any Church rites: baptism, marriage, last rites, etc. Ultimately this treatment from the Church was one of the straws that broke the nobilities backs and in 1211 they forced King John to sign the Magna Carta.
Picture if you will a 13th century European country shunned by Rome. At this moment in time the Catholic Church probably had more influence and power over the average European citizen than any monarch. It was certainly more of a daily presence in the lives of the citizenry than any King would be. The absence of the Church created a perfect storm for opportunists willing to use superstition, intimidation and hell fire for their own gain. The Church was far from perfect but sometimes life is easier with the Devil you know.
In The Gallows Curse we get to wallow in 500+ pages of schemers, prophecy, secrets, treachery, history, invention and Gothic melodrama. In the middle of this entertaining mix is Elena a fifteen year old maidservant at Gastmere Manor. At first Elena feels lucky to have been given the position at Gastmere but after gaining the attention of the young lord of the manor maybe Elena's luck isn't so good after all. Soon Elena is pregnant and pursued for a crime she didn't commit. She is helped by a mysterious local woman who sees Elena's troubles as her chance to settle old scores and Raffaele, steward of the manor. Raffaele is an older man consumed by his own crimes. He is convinced that there is nothing he can do to make up for the past. That belief in his own evil brings an edge to his willingness to aid Elena, does he have his own agenda?
Maitland's bag of tricks gets a workout as she plays out Elena's and Raffaele's stories against an England that has been silenced by the Church. This is where historical events butt up against everyday lives. Betrayal, superstition, curses, fear, ignorance and suspicion fester away among the populace in The Gallows Curse. Surrounding the plotline and the tensions in the novel is the filthy, thick with foreboding atmosphere Maitland has layered into the book. Every twist of the tale brings Elena further away from safety and the reader deeper into a brutal, every day could be your last time period.
So far there is no pub date for a U.S. edition of The Gallows Curse. Her other two novels were published over here so this might just me a matter of time. My edition came from the U.K.
May 31, 2011
Oh my goodness - Wow isn't nearly a good enough superlative for what this author does.
Having LOVED her first 2 books I was a touch nervous starting The Gallows curse in case it didn't live up to my very high expectations ...
But it exceeded them. I just cannot fault this lady's writing, she brings the dark ages to life in the most believeable ways, her use of modern language in conversation heavily peppered with atmospheric curses, makes it even more accessible and easy to read yet the meticulous research and vast amount of facts and folklore she manages to cram in, make you feel you've experienced her stories not just read them.
We follow the story of Elena, a Villein, plucked from village life and called to the manor to perform a simple task which has horrific repercussions in her life and those whose lives touch hers.
Tricked by Raffaele, the main male character, returned from the crusades, bearing guilt and a desire for revenge which taint his life.
In part the story is narrated by a mandrake and is steeped in witchcraft, myth, magic and superstition. To say much more might spoil the spell which will be cast over you when you journey back to the early 13th century and wallow around the marshes of Norfolk.
Fantastic, enjoyable, atmospheric writing. I really battled between picking the book up and cracking on with it as I was desperate to know what happened next and leaving it a while as I so dreaded it coming to an end. Well all good things must come to an end.
If you haven't read anything by Karen Maitland yet please do give her books a try, she is rapidly rising to the very top of my favourite authors list.
Having LOVED her first 2 books I was a touch nervous starting The Gallows curse in case it didn't live up to my very high expectations ...
But it exceeded them. I just cannot fault this lady's writing, she brings the dark ages to life in the most believeable ways, her use of modern language in conversation heavily peppered with atmospheric curses, makes it even more accessible and easy to read yet the meticulous research and vast amount of facts and folklore she manages to cram in, make you feel you've experienced her stories not just read them.
We follow the story of Elena, a Villein, plucked from village life and called to the manor to perform a simple task which has horrific repercussions in her life and those whose lives touch hers.
Tricked by Raffaele, the main male character, returned from the crusades, bearing guilt and a desire for revenge which taint his life.
In part the story is narrated by a mandrake and is steeped in witchcraft, myth, magic and superstition. To say much more might spoil the spell which will be cast over you when you journey back to the early 13th century and wallow around the marshes of Norfolk.
Fantastic, enjoyable, atmospheric writing. I really battled between picking the book up and cracking on with it as I was desperate to know what happened next and leaving it a while as I so dreaded it coming to an end. Well all good things must come to an end.
If you haven't read anything by Karen Maitland yet please do give her books a try, she is rapidly rising to the very top of my favourite authors list.
May 23, 2012
2 stars may be a little harsh, but considering I gave Company of Liars 4, and Owl Killers 3, it had to be two. Consider it a 2.5
I did enjoy this book at the start. I do love Maitland's mixing of Medieval history with the superstitions and witchery of the time, but I felt the plot of this novel fell flat consistently. At the end it felt like a chore just to keep reading. It seems she really underestimates her readers, constantly hinting at 'secrets', just incase she was being too subtle, meaning the big 'reveals' have already been guessed at two pages after they were first mentioned.
I also found I had no connection with any of the characters whatsoever. Although you were clearly supposed to sympathise with the protaganist Elena, I found her scenes almost painful. She was entirely clueless about pretty much everything that touched upon her within the novel, and her position as villein goes nowhere near close enough to justify just how naive and yes, stupid this girl is. All of the other characters around her (save the equally simple Athan) manage to keep their wits about them in order to survive, Elena only manages it through everyone else's sacrifices. Ma at the end declaring how she's actually so much tougher than she'd have ever thought, was just laughable, as she had done everything to prove otherwise up until that point.
It really is a shame, as I do enjoy the historical context put into the novel, and as I said before, the supernatural elements, I just wish the characters had been able to carry it better.
I did enjoy this book at the start. I do love Maitland's mixing of Medieval history with the superstitions and witchery of the time, but I felt the plot of this novel fell flat consistently. At the end it felt like a chore just to keep reading. It seems she really underestimates her readers, constantly hinting at 'secrets', just incase she was being too subtle, meaning the big 'reveals' have already been guessed at two pages after they were first mentioned.
I also found I had no connection with any of the characters whatsoever. Although you were clearly supposed to sympathise with the protaganist Elena, I found her scenes almost painful. She was entirely clueless about pretty much everything that touched upon her within the novel, and her position as villein goes nowhere near close enough to justify just how naive and yes, stupid this girl is. All of the other characters around her (save the equally simple Athan) manage to keep their wits about them in order to survive, Elena only manages it through everyone else's sacrifices. Ma at the end declaring how she's actually so much tougher than she'd have ever thought, was just laughable, as she had done everything to prove otherwise up until that point.
It really is a shame, as I do enjoy the historical context put into the novel, and as I said before, the supernatural elements, I just wish the characters had been able to carry it better.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 29, 2011
Book review of The Gallows Curse by Karen Maitland
I discovered Karen Maitland when I read her first book, The Company of Liars, and reading her third novel, Gallows Curse, I am once again struck my the colourful, vivid writing that makes her novels stand out from others. You can literally smell the brothel, touch the food, see the hair ornaments twinkle…
Lots of meaty discussions can be had from this historical novel, which has much resonance for the modern reader. Epic in length, gritty in tone, it is set in 1210; a time of filth, superstition, and suspicion. Narrated by a mandrake, the novel is intersected with advice from The mandrake’s Herbal which is a fascinating touch.
The novel has mainly themes to explore: sexuality, religion, deception, the supernatural. Something for everyone! The inclusion of castrati, Raffaele, was especially interesting and made me think for the first time about the life of a man mutilated as a child to create an `angelic` voice.
Elena has been chosen by Raffaele to be a sin eater. She is tricked into taking on Gerard’s sins and this has a devastating effect on her dreams and life, leading to a sequence of events that take us from the fenland town of Gastmere to the massacre of the Saracen prisoners at Acre, taking in Raffaele’s Italian boyhood along the way. Epic in its scope and ambition.
Through it you can visit medieval England, sense the squalor in the air.
A fantastic book, highly recommended.
I discovered Karen Maitland when I read her first book, The Company of Liars, and reading her third novel, Gallows Curse, I am once again struck my the colourful, vivid writing that makes her novels stand out from others. You can literally smell the brothel, touch the food, see the hair ornaments twinkle…
Lots of meaty discussions can be had from this historical novel, which has much resonance for the modern reader. Epic in length, gritty in tone, it is set in 1210; a time of filth, superstition, and suspicion. Narrated by a mandrake, the novel is intersected with advice from The mandrake’s Herbal which is a fascinating touch.
The novel has mainly themes to explore: sexuality, religion, deception, the supernatural. Something for everyone! The inclusion of castrati, Raffaele, was especially interesting and made me think for the first time about the life of a man mutilated as a child to create an `angelic` voice.
Elena has been chosen by Raffaele to be a sin eater. She is tricked into taking on Gerard’s sins and this has a devastating effect on her dreams and life, leading to a sequence of events that take us from the fenland town of Gastmere to the massacre of the Saracen prisoners at Acre, taking in Raffaele’s Italian boyhood along the way. Epic in its scope and ambition.
Through it you can visit medieval England, sense the squalor in the air.
A fantastic book, highly recommended.
March 22, 2014
Once I realized this was a juicy medieval soap opera, as opposed to a serious historical novel, I quite enjoyed it. It's fast-paced, entertaining fun. Just don't expect great writing or characterization. The words and characters are there to move the plot along, nothing more. Evil noblemen, witches, wenches and whores all scheme and plot each others deaths according to their superstition of choice. Elena, the teenage protagonist, is as dense as a London fog. Her biggest fan, Raffe, is a castrated semi-decent nobleman who is not half as complex as he thinks he is. I was much more interested in the narrator, a bitchy mandrake whom we sadly don't get to know very well. I'd read a sequel about her adventures any day.
November 26, 2018
Mortals are strange creatures; they cling to life even when that life is nothing but pain and misery, yet they will throw away their lives for a word, an idea, even a flag.
This is my second read by this author, the first having been Company of Liars. I find her books to be a slow burn, a gradual build-up of events with a solid ending that makes the slow core of the book worthwhile.
The Gallows Curse has an interesting format, each chapter being broken up by snippets of information about herbs or superstitions believed by people of the times. After reading these, the herbs often make an appearance and given what you just learned about them it adds another dimension to the book I found quite clever.
That being said this book is about tragedy. There are triggers present - like rape and especially rape of children. I can see others not enjoying it for that reason. Parts of it were fairly difficult for me. But if you can get past all that, the ending has twists you won't see coming and a powerful message about the strange creatures called "mortals".
This is my second read by this author, the first having been Company of Liars. I find her books to be a slow burn, a gradual build-up of events with a solid ending that makes the slow core of the book worthwhile.
The Gallows Curse has an interesting format, each chapter being broken up by snippets of information about herbs or superstitions believed by people of the times. After reading these, the herbs often make an appearance and given what you just learned about them it adds another dimension to the book I found quite clever.
That being said this book is about tragedy. There are triggers present - like rape and especially rape of children. I can see others not enjoying it for that reason. Parts of it were fairly difficult for me. But if you can get past all that, the ending has twists you won't see coming and a powerful message about the strange creatures called "mortals".
June 18, 2013
Mandrake root has been believed to be capable of many, many things, but who knew it also had narrative talent?
Such is the conceit of The Gallows Curse, in which a mandrake root tells the story of various intrigues taking place during the reign of King John the Worst*, aka John Lackland, specifically during the height of his dispute with Pope Innocent III over who got to pick the Archbishop of Canterbury, which, as the main flow of this novel opens, has not only resulted in John's excommunication but also in, effectively, a complete interdiction on church activity in John's dominions. While neither the King nor the Pope exactly chose this, their dispute left all the parish priests and bishops so afraid that most of them fled or went into hiding.
Result: no one can take confession. No one can get married. No one can have a Christian burial. Et cetera. With interesting results, conceit #2 being -- and I cannot dispute this or call it far-fetched in any way -- that the interdiction had the effect of driving good Christians at least partway back into the arms of a paganism that still survived at least insomuch as there were "cunning women" and all sorts of lively superstition still abroad in Merrie Olde, which superstitions and folk beliefs are cleverly disclosed between chapters in the form of extended quotations from something called the Mandrake's Herbal.
More specifically, The Gallows Curse involves the story of some returned crusaders who variously compelled or were compelled to perform an especially hideous act, the nature of which is kept secret through most of the novel. All we know as the story begins to unfold (told, as I say, by a mandrake root, though we could easily forget this for long stretches that are indistinguishable, narratively, from any other novel written in good old First Person Omniscient, without the odd reminder here and there in the form of the mandrake root's breaking the fourth wall and making a direct observation -- which, I'll confess, I found a bit disappointing, wishing that Maitland had tried harder to invent a real and unique narrative voice for the mandrake narrator) is that it was bad enough to weigh so heavily on one's conscience when he lays dying, and dying unshriven, that his best friend, Raffaele, resorts to tricking an innocent local girl into acting as a sin eater over his friend's corpse.
Much of the rest of the novel's plot spins out from that simple action, and while we spend far too much time with the local girl, Elena (who is, of course, not as innocent as she gave out she was when she was engaged by Raffaele; in fact, she was pregnant when she ate his friend's sins, which causes all sorts of interesting trouble later on), her course brings us into contact with some pretty interesting characters, many of them Bechdel-passing females of considerable wit and strength and interest -- they would not be out of place in a Dorothy Dunnett novel -- and, weirdly, into the heart of a plot against King John.
But chiefly for me, the interest in The Gallows Curse lies in its exploration of what the world would be like if all of the folk beliefs in the Mandrake's Herbal were true, if sniffing a marigold every morning would keep you from getting sick, if carrying certain seeds made you invisible, if tying a sack of live mice around your neck would get rid of a cough, etc. Maitland does a pretty good job of imagining the inner lives of people living in that kind of world, something I've wanted to see every since I encountered the made-up academic disciplines of Clement Hollier in Robertson Davies' wonderful The Rebel Angels.
I did have to put this book on pause for a while, though. Like a lot of snobby readers (cough! SJ! cough!) I have some rage-triggers. Overuse of "whilst" is one I share with SJ, but I have one that sends me into tantrums worse than that, and one that writers employ all the damned time. I'm talking specifically about a phrase that gets slipped in when describing beverages. God, why do you writers keep doing this? Do you think it's sophisticated? Clever? Original? It's NOT. Anyway, I'm talking about mentioning a beverage, say, wine, and then, usually within the same sentence, then describing it as "the [color] liquid." So one might come out with "'This beer is good,' Blah said, sipping (sometimes "quaffing") the amber liquid." Or in this case, one character offers another a flagon of wine and he pours "the ruby liquid." STOP STOP STOP STOP STOP.
But anyway, that's just a pet peeve, and after a few days enjoyment of less doltish prose (that being The Six Directions of Space and some Patrick O'Brian), I returned to this gladly, because I wanted to see where the story was going, even if it was mostly with (sigh) Elena. And really, rage trigger aside, there is some nice prose here. And lots of inventiveness. It was worth getting over my ire, it really was.
And here I have to give a shout out to my own dear personal mom, who recommended it to me, albeit indirectly. When BooksFree finally punted on providing this and several others on her wish list, she decided to punt on BooksFree and finally let me get her an ebook reader, and agreed to share with me a list of as many of the titles she was missing out on as she could recall. Of course my sister and I got them all for her, to fill her new reader! Anyway, it wound up being quite an intriguing list. This is the first of those I've read -- I was sucked in by that fantastic cover art! -- but it won't be my last, and it won't be my last Karen Maitland, either.
Especially when I see via GoodReads that lots of people do not consider The Gallows Curse to be her best work!
*Wink to you fans of Disney's Robin Hood.
Such is the conceit of The Gallows Curse, in which a mandrake root tells the story of various intrigues taking place during the reign of King John the Worst*, aka John Lackland, specifically during the height of his dispute with Pope Innocent III over who got to pick the Archbishop of Canterbury, which, as the main flow of this novel opens, has not only resulted in John's excommunication but also in, effectively, a complete interdiction on church activity in John's dominions. While neither the King nor the Pope exactly chose this, their dispute left all the parish priests and bishops so afraid that most of them fled or went into hiding.
Result: no one can take confession. No one can get married. No one can have a Christian burial. Et cetera. With interesting results, conceit #2 being -- and I cannot dispute this or call it far-fetched in any way -- that the interdiction had the effect of driving good Christians at least partway back into the arms of a paganism that still survived at least insomuch as there were "cunning women" and all sorts of lively superstition still abroad in Merrie Olde, which superstitions and folk beliefs are cleverly disclosed between chapters in the form of extended quotations from something called the Mandrake's Herbal.
More specifically, The Gallows Curse involves the story of some returned crusaders who variously compelled or were compelled to perform an especially hideous act, the nature of which is kept secret through most of the novel. All we know as the story begins to unfold (told, as I say, by a mandrake root, though we could easily forget this for long stretches that are indistinguishable, narratively, from any other novel written in good old First Person Omniscient, without the odd reminder here and there in the form of the mandrake root's breaking the fourth wall and making a direct observation -- which, I'll confess, I found a bit disappointing, wishing that Maitland had tried harder to invent a real and unique narrative voice for the mandrake narrator) is that it was bad enough to weigh so heavily on one's conscience when he lays dying, and dying unshriven, that his best friend, Raffaele, resorts to tricking an innocent local girl into acting as a sin eater over his friend's corpse.
Much of the rest of the novel's plot spins out from that simple action, and while we spend far too much time with the local girl, Elena (who is, of course, not as innocent as she gave out she was when she was engaged by Raffaele; in fact, she was pregnant when she ate his friend's sins, which causes all sorts of interesting trouble later on), her course brings us into contact with some pretty interesting characters, many of them Bechdel-passing females of considerable wit and strength and interest -- they would not be out of place in a Dorothy Dunnett novel -- and, weirdly, into the heart of a plot against King John.
But chiefly for me, the interest in The Gallows Curse lies in its exploration of what the world would be like if all of the folk beliefs in the Mandrake's Herbal were true, if sniffing a marigold every morning would keep you from getting sick, if carrying certain seeds made you invisible, if tying a sack of live mice around your neck would get rid of a cough, etc. Maitland does a pretty good job of imagining the inner lives of people living in that kind of world, something I've wanted to see every since I encountered the made-up academic disciplines of Clement Hollier in Robertson Davies' wonderful The Rebel Angels.
I did have to put this book on pause for a while, though. Like a lot of snobby readers (cough! SJ! cough!) I have some rage-triggers. Overuse of "whilst" is one I share with SJ, but I have one that sends me into tantrums worse than that, and one that writers employ all the damned time. I'm talking specifically about a phrase that gets slipped in when describing beverages. God, why do you writers keep doing this? Do you think it's sophisticated? Clever? Original? It's NOT. Anyway, I'm talking about mentioning a beverage, say, wine, and then, usually within the same sentence, then describing it as "the [color] liquid." So one might come out with "'This beer is good,' Blah said, sipping (sometimes "quaffing") the amber liquid." Or in this case, one character offers another a flagon of wine and he pours "the ruby liquid." STOP STOP STOP STOP STOP.
But anyway, that's just a pet peeve, and after a few days enjoyment of less doltish prose (that being The Six Directions of Space and some Patrick O'Brian), I returned to this gladly, because I wanted to see where the story was going, even if it was mostly with (sigh) Elena. And really, rage trigger aside, there is some nice prose here. And lots of inventiveness. It was worth getting over my ire, it really was.
And here I have to give a shout out to my own dear personal mom, who recommended it to me, albeit indirectly. When BooksFree finally punted on providing this and several others on her wish list, she decided to punt on BooksFree and finally let me get her an ebook reader, and agreed to share with me a list of as many of the titles she was missing out on as she could recall. Of course my sister and I got them all for her, to fill her new reader! Anyway, it wound up being quite an intriguing list. This is the first of those I've read -- I was sucked in by that fantastic cover art! -- but it won't be my last, and it won't be my last Karen Maitland, either.
Especially when I see via GoodReads that lots of people do not consider The Gallows Curse to be her best work!
*Wink to you fans of Disney's Robin Hood.
October 7, 2017
Much of what I've come to expect in Maitlands books, strong interesting female characters, lots of superstition, well developed historical setting and a good story. The plot drew me in and the story kept a good pace. The longer story in the backgtound feeding into the main plot is well worked. It all got a little over twisted at the end but still an enjoyable read.
June 9, 2011
Having suffered from a severe bout of Reader's Block recently, my flagging reading mojo was instantly revived by Karen Maitland's medieval romp, The Owl Killers. Admittedly, the reading location - poolside in a secluded spot in the Algarve, sun splitting the trees etc - might have helped matters somewhat! Anyway, I wanted more of the same and fearing a relapse, I dived straight into Ms Maitland's recent release, The Gallow's Curse.
Set in 1210, we are immersed in the sights and sounds of England at a very peculiar time - it is the time of the Papal Interdict caused by King John's refusal to accept the papal choice for Archbishop of Canterbury. Pope Innocent banned priests from adminstering the sacraments and Christian burial was forbidden. This forces the country into a state of chaos, particularly amongst the poor for whom faith was their one saving grace.
Our female protagonist, Elena, is a young "villein" (peasant) who is tricked by her betters at the Manor. She unwittingly takes on the sins of the deceased Lord of the Manor via the ancient practice of sin-eating and what follows is a series of tragic events which cause her to sink into deeper and deeper trouble. In a country where confession is no longer available, Elena now faces eternal damnation. Raffaele, steward of the Manor, feels responsible for Elena's fate but can he save her from evil forces at work, both natural and supernatural?
As in her previous novels, the author succeeds in capturing the ambiance of medieval England complete with its own particular superstitions and folklore. As well as showing us the viccissitudes of the great unwashed, we are given a taste of the political intrigue engulfing England during the five year period of the Papal Interdict. There is an impressive supporting cast of characters including a female dwarf who runs a brothel in Norwich and two evil brothers who are determined to hunt Elena down.
Unfortunately, The Gallow's Curse failed to engage me as much as its two predecessors, The Company of Liars and The Owl Killers. I did find the historical background interesting, some of the herbal folklore was intriguing but the two main characters never really came to life for me and I didn't particularly care what fate held for them. All in all, just an okay read for me.
Set in 1210, we are immersed in the sights and sounds of England at a very peculiar time - it is the time of the Papal Interdict caused by King John's refusal to accept the papal choice for Archbishop of Canterbury. Pope Innocent banned priests from adminstering the sacraments and Christian burial was forbidden. This forces the country into a state of chaos, particularly amongst the poor for whom faith was their one saving grace.
Our female protagonist, Elena, is a young "villein" (peasant) who is tricked by her betters at the Manor. She unwittingly takes on the sins of the deceased Lord of the Manor via the ancient practice of sin-eating and what follows is a series of tragic events which cause her to sink into deeper and deeper trouble. In a country where confession is no longer available, Elena now faces eternal damnation. Raffaele, steward of the Manor, feels responsible for Elena's fate but can he save her from evil forces at work, both natural and supernatural?
As in her previous novels, the author succeeds in capturing the ambiance of medieval England complete with its own particular superstitions and folklore. As well as showing us the viccissitudes of the great unwashed, we are given a taste of the political intrigue engulfing England during the five year period of the Papal Interdict. There is an impressive supporting cast of characters including a female dwarf who runs a brothel in Norwich and two evil brothers who are determined to hunt Elena down.
Unfortunately, The Gallow's Curse failed to engage me as much as its two predecessors, The Company of Liars and The Owl Killers. I did find the historical background interesting, some of the herbal folklore was intriguing but the two main characters never really came to life for me and I didn't particularly care what fate held for them. All in all, just an okay read for me.
May 19, 2012
Maitland creates a dark world of superstition and religious fervor which seemed to me to give the authentic feel of the early Middle Ages. With England under a Papal interdict and all the churches closed and the priests either exiled or in hiding all the inhabitants, high and low, are obsessed with the fear of hell and damnation. Innocent Elena is forced, unknowingly, to become a 'sin eater', to take on the sins of a dead knight and to give up her baby to the local 'wise woman'. This story is set against a more conventional tale of spies and political intrigue as King John's men try to fend off a potential attack from France. As the story progresses the supernatural element takes over and it does require a willing suspension of disbelief to enter into it fully. The brutality of the period is expressed in gruesome detail. Maitland has no mercy on her characters and all have to suffer, the innocent as well as the guilty.
The book is based on meticulous research and Maitland's knowledge of herbs and plants and their use in spells and charms is encyclopedic. The result is a fusion of Gothic Horror with conventional historical fiction which will haunt your dreams long after you have read the last page.
The book is based on meticulous research and Maitland's knowledge of herbs and plants and their use in spells and charms is encyclopedic. The result is a fusion of Gothic Horror with conventional historical fiction which will haunt your dreams long after you have read the last page.
August 17, 2019
story 3/5 Weird...
characters 3/5 Being narrated by a mandrake which is very fitting for this "magical readathon", so I'll take it.
writing 3/5
audio/paper Paper!
reread? Maybe? I'll give her other books a shot.
characters 3/5 Being narrated by a mandrake which is very fitting for this "magical readathon", so I'll take it.
writing 3/5
audio/paper Paper!
reread? Maybe? I'll give her other books a shot.
October 14, 2013
Whilst, for me, this novel didn't engaged as much as its predecessors Company of Liars and The Owl Killers its evocation of Medieval England and the delicious mixing of natural and supernatural make for an entertaining, satisfying read.
Set in 1210, during the time of Pope Innocent's Interdict of 1208, which rendered England spiritually desolate by closing down the churches for six years as punishment for King John’s refusal to accept Stephen Langton as Archbishop of Canterbury. The Edict removed the sacraments and Christian services including a shriven Christian burial.
The practise of, and belief in pagan myth, magic and superstition was part of everyday life and is at the centre of this tale. The book has an intriguing narrator in the shape of ‘Yadua’ the mandrake, a plant shrouded in lore and superstition who at the start of each chapter reads from the “The Mandrake’s Herbal” which tells of the various powers of herbs, animals, trees and flowers and there use in witchcraft. A nice, original touch which gives an atmosphere of foreboding throughout
The story focuses on two main characters: The lord of the manor’s middle-aged steward, Raffaelle, who has a dark past including crimes committed during the Crusades, for which he believes he is eternally dammed. And Elena, a 15-year-old serving girl, tricked into becoming a sin eater to absolve the sins of the lord of the manner. This all goes horribly wrong and leaves Elena haunted by the curse and blamed for a murder she didn’t commit. She flees her village with the aided by Raffaelle, who blames himself for the girl’s predicament.
So the reader is plunged into a medieval world of betrayal, revenge, superstition, religion and treason. As with the author’s other novels there is a collection of wonderfully drawn characters, the one that was the most interesting to me was the brothel Madam and not either of the leads…maybe that is why I didn’t fall in love with it as much as Company of Liars.
Karen Maitland is building a reputation for twisty-turney ambiguous endings and this one doesn’t disappoint…
Overall a good solid read but lacking something …maybe the ambition and sheer ingenuity of Company of Liars.
Set in 1210, during the time of Pope Innocent's Interdict of 1208, which rendered England spiritually desolate by closing down the churches for six years as punishment for King John’s refusal to accept Stephen Langton as Archbishop of Canterbury. The Edict removed the sacraments and Christian services including a shriven Christian burial.
The practise of, and belief in pagan myth, magic and superstition was part of everyday life and is at the centre of this tale. The book has an intriguing narrator in the shape of ‘Yadua’ the mandrake, a plant shrouded in lore and superstition who at the start of each chapter reads from the “The Mandrake’s Herbal” which tells of the various powers of herbs, animals, trees and flowers and there use in witchcraft. A nice, original touch which gives an atmosphere of foreboding throughout
The story focuses on two main characters: The lord of the manor’s middle-aged steward, Raffaelle, who has a dark past including crimes committed during the Crusades, for which he believes he is eternally dammed. And Elena, a 15-year-old serving girl, tricked into becoming a sin eater to absolve the sins of the lord of the manner. This all goes horribly wrong and leaves Elena haunted by the curse and blamed for a murder she didn’t commit. She flees her village with the aided by Raffaelle, who blames himself for the girl’s predicament.
So the reader is plunged into a medieval world of betrayal, revenge, superstition, religion and treason. As with the author’s other novels there is a collection of wonderfully drawn characters, the one that was the most interesting to me was the brothel Madam and not either of the leads…maybe that is why I didn’t fall in love with it as much as Company of Liars.
Karen Maitland is building a reputation for twisty-turney ambiguous endings and this one doesn’t disappoint…
Overall a good solid read but lacking something …maybe the ambition and sheer ingenuity of Company of Liars.
March 10, 2011
Elena is 16 years old, a naive, fragile flame-haired girl, working as a maid for Lady Anne. She becomes pregnant and has strange dreams in which she appears to kill her new born baby.
Raffaele is a middle-aged man, steward to Lady Anne, he has carried out horrendous crimes in his past for which he can’t forgive himself, but I believe he is a good man. And he has a soft spot for Elena.
Due to a deliberate act of well-meaning deceipt, their lives become bound forever together.
The year is 1210 -- not a good year in England -- King John has opposed the Pope in wanting his own man to be the Archbishop of Canterbury, not the man that the Pope has requested. As a punishment the Pope has denied the people all the rites of the church; no church services, no baptisms, no last rites for the dying.
Against this backdrop of fear, as Elena is accused of murdering her baby and sentenced to hang by the evil Lord Osborn, who has now taken over Lady Anne’s house, she flees to safety but her nightmares have only just begun. The man who hunts her, Osborn, will stop at nothing to find her but Raffaele is equally determined to protect her at all costs.
I enjoyed this book enormously, the writing was pacy, descriptive and compelling. All the characters, both good and bad, were full of life.
People were God fearing and I was fascinated by the many superstitions the people believed in such as spitting 3 times on their forefingers to ward off evil and laying a mistletoe twig and sprinkling salt in a newborn’s crib to prevent the faeries abducting the child. They were terrified of their souls rotting in hell if they didn’t carry out these practices.
I could almost smell the rotting food and raw sewage running through the middle of the tiny streets and feel the evil among the all enveloping darkness when all that could be seen was an odd chink of light coming from one of the run down houses.
This is a story full of treachery, lies, treason with a murder or two thrown in for good measure! The original plotline kept me hooked throughout all 500+ pages, the story never slowed down, I didn’t think there were any boring parts.
If you enjoy reading books like The Pillars of the Earth I’m pretty sure you will enjoy this!
From Carole's Book Corner
Raffaele is a middle-aged man, steward to Lady Anne, he has carried out horrendous crimes in his past for which he can’t forgive himself, but I believe he is a good man. And he has a soft spot for Elena.
Due to a deliberate act of well-meaning deceipt, their lives become bound forever together.
The year is 1210 -- not a good year in England -- King John has opposed the Pope in wanting his own man to be the Archbishop of Canterbury, not the man that the Pope has requested. As a punishment the Pope has denied the people all the rites of the church; no church services, no baptisms, no last rites for the dying.
Against this backdrop of fear, as Elena is accused of murdering her baby and sentenced to hang by the evil Lord Osborn, who has now taken over Lady Anne’s house, she flees to safety but her nightmares have only just begun. The man who hunts her, Osborn, will stop at nothing to find her but Raffaele is equally determined to protect her at all costs.
I enjoyed this book enormously, the writing was pacy, descriptive and compelling. All the characters, both good and bad, were full of life.
People were God fearing and I was fascinated by the many superstitions the people believed in such as spitting 3 times on their forefingers to ward off evil and laying a mistletoe twig and sprinkling salt in a newborn’s crib to prevent the faeries abducting the child. They were terrified of their souls rotting in hell if they didn’t carry out these practices.
I could almost smell the rotting food and raw sewage running through the middle of the tiny streets and feel the evil among the all enveloping darkness when all that could be seen was an odd chink of light coming from one of the run down houses.
This is a story full of treachery, lies, treason with a murder or two thrown in for good measure! The original plotline kept me hooked throughout all 500+ pages, the story never slowed down, I didn’t think there were any boring parts.
If you enjoy reading books like The Pillars of the Earth I’m pretty sure you will enjoy this!
From Carole's Book Corner
September 18, 2022
This novel, while good, was perhaps a bit of a miss for me. There's a lot going on with the plot, with sub-plots and many, many characters to keep track of. I think what truly impressed me about this book is the amount of work that Ms. Maitland invested in making the reader really feel and understand what it must have been like to have lived in medieval England, and it damn sure wouldn't have been easy. Solid 3.5 stars for me.
August 31, 2016
The Gallows Curse is narrated by Yadua, a mandrake that has a pivotal role within the story. What is a mandrake, you might ask? "Semi-human, demi gods, they call us." When it comes to this creature, this species, whatever this thing actually is, you don't get much more of an answer than that. Throughout the tale they remain a mystery, leaving you with more questions than answers. But one of the more interesting things about them is how they come about, "spring up." I won't divulge such, so as to leave it for you to discover on your own if/when you decide to read the book.
Overall, The Gallows Curse was a great read, and it definitely succeeded in achieving the goal of every author, which is to keep the reader engaged from start to finish.
While some fat could have been trimmed here and there, there were actually two instances that felt skimmed over. The first came at the beginning of the story, in which a hanging takes place. More detail would have drawn my initial interest in even deeper. This lack of description occurs once more, when the main character of Elena is forced to endure something awful. More details would have produced more empathy for her. But these two blemishes does not diminish the fact that this book is indeed a five-star read!
The ending begs for a sequel, with the reader(at least this one) hoping two characters that had no resolution at all will be brought back into Elena's story to find peace in their personal journeys, in addition to the main character, of course.
Karen Maitland would also be doing herself a great service by writing a prequel. To tell the story of the mandrakes in full. Not only to quench unanswered questions, but also to intrigue the reader so much that it very-well may spawn into a franchise of feature films.
Here's to the potential of this great story finding its way to the big screen!
Overall, The Gallows Curse was a great read, and it definitely succeeded in achieving the goal of every author, which is to keep the reader engaged from start to finish.
While some fat could have been trimmed here and there, there were actually two instances that felt skimmed over. The first came at the beginning of the story, in which a hanging takes place. More detail would have drawn my initial interest in even deeper. This lack of description occurs once more, when the main character of Elena is forced to endure something awful. More details would have produced more empathy for her. But these two blemishes does not diminish the fact that this book is indeed a five-star read!
The ending begs for a sequel, with the reader(at least this one) hoping two characters that had no resolution at all will be brought back into Elena's story to find peace in their personal journeys, in addition to the main character, of course.
Karen Maitland would also be doing herself a great service by writing a prequel. To tell the story of the mandrakes in full. Not only to quench unanswered questions, but also to intrigue the reader so much that it very-well may spawn into a franchise of feature films.
Here's to the potential of this great story finding its way to the big screen!
February 11, 2013
Having loved and reviewed Karen Maitland’s previous two books, Company of Liars and The Owl Killers, I was expecting great things from The Gallows Curse. I was not at all disappointed.
Set against the backdrop of Pope Innocent III’s Interdict imposed on England in 1208, after King John refused to accept the pope’s appointee, Stephen Langton, as Archbishop of Canterbury, The Gallows Curse is a dark and complex historical mystery.
The cast of characters is diverse, yet linked by many invisible ties. The author depicts the loneliness and terror of life as a runaway villain through the eyes of Elena, one of the main characters. The reader sympathises with her terrible predicament, and yearns to see her take revenge on her tormentors. The other main character, Raffaele, is fascinating: tortured and full of flaws, at the same time enchanting and repulsive, hero and anti-hero.
Sexual deviance, violent death, treason and cunning women with ancient grudges feature along the winding road of this story, as Elena and Raffaele, both together and alone, attempt to elude the treacherous snares thrown in their paths.
The way Karen Maitland seamlessly weaves the supernatural into the story, I could easily believe in the magic, the spells and potions, as did these medieval people. And the “mandrake” as narrator adds even more intrigue, firmly grounding the story in this age of myth and superstition.
13th-century England is depicted so vividly I could almost feel, taste and smell it, and I was mesmerised from the beginning. I would highly recommend The Gallows Curse to lovers of medieval fiction, especially to those with a taste for the darkly humorous and a few surprise twists in the tale.
Set against the backdrop of Pope Innocent III’s Interdict imposed on England in 1208, after King John refused to accept the pope’s appointee, Stephen Langton, as Archbishop of Canterbury, The Gallows Curse is a dark and complex historical mystery.
The cast of characters is diverse, yet linked by many invisible ties. The author depicts the loneliness and terror of life as a runaway villain through the eyes of Elena, one of the main characters. The reader sympathises with her terrible predicament, and yearns to see her take revenge on her tormentors. The other main character, Raffaele, is fascinating: tortured and full of flaws, at the same time enchanting and repulsive, hero and anti-hero.
Sexual deviance, violent death, treason and cunning women with ancient grudges feature along the winding road of this story, as Elena and Raffaele, both together and alone, attempt to elude the treacherous snares thrown in their paths.
The way Karen Maitland seamlessly weaves the supernatural into the story, I could easily believe in the magic, the spells and potions, as did these medieval people. And the “mandrake” as narrator adds even more intrigue, firmly grounding the story in this age of myth and superstition.
13th-century England is depicted so vividly I could almost feel, taste and smell it, and I was mesmerised from the beginning. I would highly recommend The Gallows Curse to lovers of medieval fiction, especially to those with a taste for the darkly humorous and a few surprise twists in the tale.
November 10, 2011
Nobody writes the Middle Ages better than Karen Maitland. Her skill at ensconcing the reader into the setting is masterful. The mud and muck and the stink of living in an age of no plumbing and dirt roads are brought to life along with the characters who toil daily to survive it all. Maitland's latest tale takes place under the reign of King John, son of Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine, when the Pope Innocent III has imposed an Interdict on England due to the refusal of King John to accept the Pope's choice for Archbishop of Canterbury. So, with the churches being closed, no baptisms, consecrated burials, weddings, or confessions of sins can take place. The King is also searching for traitors to the throne, those who are siding with France against him. The village of Gastmere is caught in throes of this religious/political turmoil, a microcosm of a world turned upside down. A servant girl named Elena and the lord of the manor's stewart Rafffaele become bound to one another in an attempt to circumvent the restrictions of the dangerous times. With a curse of a cunning woman from a previous century guiding the plot, there is plenty of mystery, tragedy, murder, betrayal, and secrecy to expertly fulfill the requirements of historical fiction of the Middle Ages. It's a wild ride from beginning to end, which, of course, you won't see coming.
April 28, 2012
The Gallows Curse was an impulse buy - although I am a huge fan of historical fiction, many of the books set in the Dark Ages that I have read have been very dull. But The Gallows Curse is very different.
I found the additions of the Mandrake's Herbal really helped to bring it to life, and portray the superstitions and beliefs at the time, which to me was crucial. I found the characters, while not always believable and sometimes not even likeable, to be intriguing and I constantly felt I wanted to know what happened to them all, whether i liked them or not.
The story itself was wonderful, full of twists in the plots that keep you guessing and in suspense - often I found I could not put the book down, I was so engrossed in it - so hooked I read it in a day! It really is a fantastic book and I could read it again and again, as every time you read it you notice something new. The descriptions are startlingly real - even gruesome in some places.
I would highly recommend this as it is a feeling and detailed story, guaranteed to be remembered long after you have finished reading it.
I found the additions of the Mandrake's Herbal really helped to bring it to life, and portray the superstitions and beliefs at the time, which to me was crucial. I found the characters, while not always believable and sometimes not even likeable, to be intriguing and I constantly felt I wanted to know what happened to them all, whether i liked them or not.
The story itself was wonderful, full of twists in the plots that keep you guessing and in suspense - often I found I could not put the book down, I was so engrossed in it - so hooked I read it in a day! It really is a fantastic book and I could read it again and again, as every time you read it you notice something new. The descriptions are startlingly real - even gruesome in some places.
I would highly recommend this as it is a feeling and detailed story, guaranteed to be remembered long after you have finished reading it.
March 7, 2015
My third book by this author and it did not disappoint. One thing it did make me realise - I am so glad I did not live during this period of history! To say life was difficult is an understatement. Just Like Karen's other novels the historical detail is fantastic. I also particularly liked the start of each chapter with the extracts from the Mandrakes handbook. Some of these were most illuminating - my favourite is the one about the ants.
The novel itself is full of twists and turns with Master Raffe as a brilliant hero, unexpected, flawed but brave in his own way. The heroine, Elena, at only sixteen has to face up to some extremely alarming and unpleasant circumstances and I was right there with her, willing it to work out for her. The idea of an interdict lasting years and preventing burials, marriages and christenings in a time when it was far too easy to feel your soul was damned to everlasting hell must have been a frightening and makes a great backdrop for this story.
The novel itself is full of twists and turns with Master Raffe as a brilliant hero, unexpected, flawed but brave in his own way. The heroine, Elena, at only sixteen has to face up to some extremely alarming and unpleasant circumstances and I was right there with her, willing it to work out for her. The idea of an interdict lasting years and preventing burials, marriages and christenings in a time when it was far too easy to feel your soul was damned to everlasting hell must have been a frightening and makes a great backdrop for this story.
June 2, 2011
Set in the Norfolk marshes with more than enough Gothic gloom to feed the soul, the dark and dirty 13C is brought gloriously to life in this third novel by Karen Maitland. Beautifully crafted from the beginning, and teeming with superstition, this story transports you back to the brutal days in our history, when dark and Godless forces roamed freely, and violent crimes were accepted without question.
I have total admiration for an author who can recreate a world so entirely that as you read, you can feel the hairs on the back of your neck stand up, and when you are forced back to the 21C ,the smell of wood smoke still lingers in the air, and you can almost imagine you are still there......
Loved every word.
http://jaffareadstoo.blogspot.com/
I have total admiration for an author who can recreate a world so entirely that as you read, you can feel the hairs on the back of your neck stand up, and when you are forced back to the 21C ,the smell of wood smoke still lingers in the air, and you can almost imagine you are still there......
Loved every word.
http://jaffareadstoo.blogspot.com/
October 23, 2012
Good...but not as good as Company of Liars or The Owl Keepers. It seems that in the other two books the story line would twist and turn to keep you guessing. Though this one also holds many secrets that you must keep reading to discover, it just wasn't as riveting. I also didn't find the characters quite as sympathetic as those in the other two books. (well, I feel sorry for anyone who had to live through that day and age) I just wasn't as invested. I found Elena to be a little whiny and self centered. (like most 16 year olds) That said, if you like Karen Maitland you should definitely read this. Still an interesting story and a wonderful look at the time period and the history/beliefs/superstitions surrounding it.
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