has anyone read The Anchoress by Robyn Cadwallader?

[carlajean]

I just finished it and would be interested to hear what others thought (I thought it was excellent, and would recommend it).

I took a free sample on my Kindle, based on your recommendation. It seems an interesting idea, but.... I am a bit of a name geek and couldn't help noticing straight away that the heroine was named Sarah and her maid was named Louise ..... in the 13th century. Nope, I don't think so. They would have had names like Margery, Alice, Eleanor, Joan. That an English working class woman would be named Louise in this period is historically highly unlikely (the name would probably be unheard of, at least in England) and a teensy bit of research would have told the author so.

You may say, what does it matter, it's only names, but the thing is, if the author couldn't even be bothered to get the names right, what other historical stuff has she got wrong throughout the book? You have to trust the author's voice to a certain extent, and this would really bug me.

So it's a no from me to reading the whole book I'm afraid.

In her defence, Robyn Cadwallader is an academic specialising in Medieval Literature, so I'm assuming her historical knowledge is broadly sound. Think she's also published a book based on her PhD thesis.

Interesting about the names, I never thought of that! (I still think it's good though)

I loved it. At one point I thought the plot was going to go down a drippy romantic route, but nope, it didn't disappoint.