Following the confirmation of the rather mysterious death of her husband fighting in France, "she had emerged from seclusion (seven years as an anchoress) in her hermitage at the Derwent Crossing determined to get on with life." She had inherited a substantial fortune and had decided to set up her own house of nuns where "she could teach the young and tend the sick". She seems far from the conventional idea of a medieval nun, and to be inspired not so much by religious fervour but by a feeling that "only by joining forces with other like-minded women in our own houses can we garner the power to change anything". But first she has to seek permission from the Abbot of Meaux. This is what she sets out to do in the first book.

She has two grown-up children, but does not seem to give them a thought, and they do not appear in the story. She is essentially a woman of action, and not one for profound religious experiences. As she explains, "We take the veil for reasons that are often more secular than not," out of a "need to do good on the world". God does not seem to come into it. She is nothing if not self-sufficient (she has no difficilty in skinning and cooking a rabbit caught by one of her hounds), and is skilled in the "physick arts", so not only knows about herbs, but does not mind examining dead bodies even when "blood, congealed and sticky, had flowed over the stone floor".

Cassandra Clark is something of a mystery figure. All we are told about her is that she lives and works in London, and that her childhood in the East Riding of Yorkshire was her inspiration for the stories. One of her daughters, Candida Clark, who is also an author, says that she was inspired by the memory of how her mother spent so much time writing. But what was she writing? There is no mention of any other published books. I would welcome more information about her (please use my Guest Book to get in touch with me).

Her agent arranged a two-book deal with John Murray for a medieval crime series. Hangman Blind is the first of the two books.

Hangman Blind (2008)
Hangman Blind starts in November 1382 in the 5th year of King Richard's reign, but he is still a boy. Hildegard, still a nun but no longer an anchoress, sets off for York and the Abbey of Meaux. It is at a time when there are rival popes in Rome and Avignon, and in England there is an uneasy peace in the savage aftermath of Wat Tyler's peasants' revolt. Hildegard encounters a gibbet with five bloodied, crow-stripped corpses, and in the next clearing, the body of a young man, brutally butchered. Who is he? And what is his connection with the murdered men?

Other violent deaths are to follow as Hildegard revisits her childhood home, Castle Hutton, which, she discovers, is riven by treachery. She needs all her skills and bravery to face up to the dangers when an attempt is made to poison Lord Roger de Hutton. Could his beautiful new (fifth) wife Melisen have anything to do with it? Melisen agrees with Roger's description of her as "a silly, vain little creature" but later on comments, "She did not seem stupid in the least". But is it possible to be both silly and not stupid at the same time?

There is no attempt to capture medieval vocabulary. Indeed the very opening sentence reads: "From the gates of the papal palace in Avignon issued a rider at a pace to make the sparks fly". But Hildegard is an adventurous lively character, even if she does not make an altogether convincing medieval nun.

By the end of the book even the initially hostile Abbot of Meaux, Hubert de Courcy, seems to succomb to Hildegard's charms: "Inhabitants of the real world with the ever-present threat of damnation in the next, they strolled together under the stippled shadows of the pear-tree walk. .... Hubert gazed into the darkening woodland, 'Hildegard - ' he began. It was the first time he had used her name. But then inexplicably his voice fell away to silence." Well, well. Then the book comes to a sudden end, leaving parts of the plot unresolved, with even the arch villain still alive. All we are told is that "Whatever might happen, and whatever stood between them (Hildregard and Hubert), all fear fell away in the certainty that they would meet again." This is all very well for the author and publisher who have a contract for the second book, but it does not seem altogether fair on the reader. And even by the end of the book, Hildegard still isn't the Abbess of Meaux, as promised on the cover.

There is hardly anything about the author on the web, although there is an interesting if inaccurate review of Hangman Blind, drawing attention to some alleged inaccuracies, on the Tangled Web UK site. The author rebuts these charges on my guestbook page! Press here to read what she wrote.

The book is available, new or used. A good source of used books is abebooks. They feature the stock of 13,000 booksellers from all over the world, and I have always found them to be very reliable.

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