Black Is the Colour of My True Love's Heart

While most people know Peters' Brother Cadfael series, I think her Inspector Felse series is much better. Freed from the demands of setting a story in a medieval setting, Peters' writing just sings. And listening to it in Simon Prebble's voice--the textbook definition of 'plummy'--is almost a sensuo......more

A weekend seminar on folk music is meeting on an historical estate, called Follymead for the wild imagination that was employed in its buildings and grounds. Amid this sinister, beautiful environment, musicians and specialists give performances almost as dramatic as the clash of huge personalities g......more

I read this perhaps thirty years ago when I was in the midst of devouring Ellis Peters' Brother Cadfael books. I decided to revisit it to see if it stood up to my memory of it. "Black is the Color..." is part of an earlier series that she wrote--the Inspector Felse books, which also feature his son......more

An old favorite. Set at a mock-Gothic estate turned music school, which provides the appropriate backdrop for what could almost be a Gothic melodrama. A weekend folk-music conference draws all the principals together: two musicians; the school warden, his wife, and his teen-age niece. Also present a......more

Don't enjoy her "modern" books quite as much as her Cadfael series, but ironically this book depicts quite a lot of 1960's period detail including:- the then 1960's hatred of Victorian architecture and how in those days nearly everyone smoked especially the supposedly sophisticated and elegant peopl......more