Fatal Feast

by Jay Ruud

Overview

When an Irish knight dies mysteriously at a banquet she is hosting' Queen Guenivere is charged with murder and faces death at the stake if found guilty. Her loyal page' Gildas' rushes to the woods to track down Merlin and convince him to take up the investigation and save the queen.

Fatal Feast is a fast-paced murder mystery set in the legendary court of Camelot' imagined as it might have existed in the high Middle Ages' with Sir Gawain' Sir Gareth' and Sir Lancelot in pivotal roles' and the young Gildas' enamored of the queen's young lady-in-waiting Rosemounde' an unlikely courtly lover focused on saving the queen and impressing his Rosemounde--not necessarily in that order.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781948338110
Publisher:	Encircle Publications, LLC
Publication date:	02/09/2018
Series:	Merlin Mystery , #1
Pages:	268
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.61(d)

About the Author

Jay Ruud is the retired Chair of the English Department at the University of Central Arkansas and former Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Northern State University. His Ph.D. in medieval literature turned him into an avid fan of the legends of King Arthur, and kindled a passion in him for retelling those stories in his own way. He has an awesome wife, two grownup children of whom he is unspeakably proud, and four spectacular grandchildren to match his four unruly dogs. He loves Chaucer, Dante, and Tolkien. In addition to all of this, he is a lifetime Cubs fan who finally lived to see a world series, he hopes one day to visit Antarctica, has played Ebenezer Scrooge and Lady Bracknell on stage, and believes that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone.

Editorial Reviews

11/24/2014
Scholar Ruud (Encyclopedia of Medieval Literature) makes his fiction debut with this promising first in an Arthurian mystery series, though as he notes at the end, “I have set this story not in the sixth century, the time of the historical Arthur’s career, but rather in the High Middle Ages... when the legendary Arthur flourished.” After Sir Patrise is poisoned at the queen’s table, Guinevere is accused of treason and murder. King Arthur is bound by duty to remain neutral but sends Guinevere’s young page, Gildas, to find Merlin and persuade him to discover Patrise’s real killer. Gildas and Merlin, who have never met before, are soon working together to save the queen before her trial by combat. Given the many names to remember, a list of characters would have been helpful, but that won’t stop enthralled readers from looking forward to the sequel. (Jan.)

Publishers Weekly

11/01/2014
When an Irish knight dies at a feast that Queen Guenivere is hosting for the Knights of the Round Table, Sir Mador accuses the queen of murder when it turns out that Sir Patrise, the deceased, had eaten a poisoned apple. Guenivere must extricate herself from this predicament without the assistance of her stalwart champion, Sir Lancelot. King Arthur dispatches Gildas, Guenivere's loyal page, into the woods to find the wizard Merlin, who has disappeared into a deep depression since being rejected by Nimue. This is just the puzzle to reignite Merlin's passion for justice. VERDICT Literary critic and scholar Ruud (Critical Companion to Dante; Encyclopedia of Medieval Literature) launches a new historical series revolving around King Arthur and his court, set here in the High Middle Ages, rather than England's more ancient past when Christianity vied with paganism as recounted in Sir Thomas Malory's Le Morte D'Arthur. The author also draws from this medieval source the story of the poisoned apple. Fans of medieval mysteries and Arthurian legends will enjoy this imaginative tale of gallant knights.

Library Journal

2014-11-20
An Irish knight's death puts King Arthur's kingdom in peril when the accused culprit is Queen Guinevere.The death of Sir Patrise comes as a complete surprise to the knights who have gathered for the feast Queen Guinevere has laid out. Who would wish to harm a foreign visitor, especially when the Irish have been so recently welcomed to Logres, the land of King Arthur's rule? But it appears that Sir Patrise has been killed by someone at the feast, and his cousin, Sir Mador, demands justice from the person he suspects as the murderer: Arthur's queen. Guinevere is shocked and wishes she could be defended by her husband. She knows, however, that his attachment to her would not warrant that level of commitment in spite of their many years of marriage. With her usual defender, Sir Lancelot, out of the country, she has none to rely on except her loyal page, Gildas. Though Arthur will not fight on Guinevere's behalf, he entreats Gildas to seek out Merlin so that the two of them may determine the identity of the true murderer while the queen awaits trial. Merlin has been sequestered in a cave, driven near madness by his obsession with Nimue, Damsel of the Lake, but he reluctantly joins Gildas in the quest to absolve Guinevere. Struggling to work together, the two wade through a People magazine's worth of court gossip, attached to the names of knights so numerous, noble and nondescript that the real problem may be distinguishing one from another.Strong in neither historical intrigue nor investigative suspense, Ruud's debut is at its best in providing its characters with sassy if questionably accurate personalities.

Kirkus Reviews