Peter Tremayne’s books about Sister Fidelma are set in the Christian world of the seventh century. Sister Fidelma herself is Irish but she travels to many locations including England and Rome. There are a number of books in this historical crime series which I have been reading on and off for a while now, as and when I find them in charity shops. This means that I haven’t read the series in order but that hasn’t been an impediment to my understanding of the plot of any of them. Our Lady of Darkness is set in Ireland and is the tenth book in the series.
To understand the plot of this book you need to know that Fidelma is a nun and the sister of an Irish Chieftain. She has trained to be an interpreter of the law and a judge so she has a status both within and outside the church. She also abides by the rules of the Irish church which at this time differed from those of the rest of Europe and she has a male companion Brother Eadulf who is a Saxon monk.
In this story Fidelma returns from abroad to be reunited with Eadulf. She finds him captive in a small town and accused of murder. It seems that no attempt has been made to determine if he has really committed the crime and he is to be hanged shortly. Fidelma seeks to bring judgement to the case but she is opposed by the religious and lay authorities of the town and there is a very good chance that Eadulf will lose his life.
The crime plot is immersed in the laws and traditions of ancient Ireland and the characters do spend quite a lot of time explaining the law to one another but that doesn’t really get in the way of the plot which is nicely tangled with plenty of red herrings and quite a few sub-plots involving power, slavery and love.
I like these books a lot and enjoy the way that the author plays the different religious traditions off against each other in the events but also in the personalities of the two main characters. I do wish, however, that the author would give some sort of pronunciation guide for the Saxon and especially the Irish names which I have to look up individually on the web – they are not intuitive to this reader.
Anne Is Reading 