The Usual Suspects Mystery Reading Group will be discussing The Sempster's Tale by Margaret Frazer next Sunday, the 12th, at two.
New faces are always welcome. To reserve a copy of the book, call 291-4821.
Dame Frevisse, a medieval Benedictine nun, seeks to recover the gold of a murdered Duke, aided by a sempster ("seamstress," as explained in an author's note, didn't come into use until the 1600s) and her Jewish lover. Their mission is jeopardized when a crucified body stirs up anti-Semitic sentiment.
Margaret Frazer is the pen name originally used by Gail Frazer and Mary Monica Pulver Kuhfeld in their collaboration on The Novice's Tale, the first of the Dame Frevisse books. This collaboration came to an end with The Murderer's Tale, the sixth book in the series. Since then, “Margaret Frazer” has been used exclusively by Gail Frazer. The series now numbers seventeen titles in all.
The Sempster’s Tale is the fifteenth title of the series, set in the summer of 1450.
Publishers Weekly praised the book’s “careful historical detail and characters you'll want to befriend.”
Several (but not all) of the books are set in or around St. Frideswide's, a nunnery in Oxfordshire. The main character, Dame Frevisse, is fictional, but she is related to Geoffrey Chaucer, and other historical personages make the occasional appearance. Several of the series books are named after Chaucer tales, but the stories are original.
Phillippa Morgan has a mystery series which features Chaucer himself acting as an agent for Edward III in the late 1300s. And P. C. Doherty writes the Nicholas Chirke Canterbury Tales mysteries in which the pilgrims tell the stories Chaucer didn't – stories of ghosts, intrigue and murder – while on pilgrimage from London to Canterbury.
The medieval mystery is an ever-expanding sub-genre.
One extremely popular series written by Peter Tremayne features Sister Fidelma, a Celtic nun in Ireland. Fidelma has been called “A seventh century Irish Nancy Drew in the guise of a young female cleric who is a trained dálaigh or legal advocate in ancient Irish law.”
There is an International Sister Fidelma Society, which publishes a 3-times yearly newsletter and coordinates trips to Ireland to visit Fidelma locations. What fun!
