The Morning Gift

by Diana Norman

Book Overview

A love story set in the 12th century against the turbulent background of civil war. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0312001592
• ISBN13: 9780312001599
• Release Date: January 1987
• Publisher: St. Martin's Press
• Length: 285 Pages
• Weight: 1.01 lbs.

Customer Reviews

fantastic and realistic medieval

Inner flap blurb time: "A Norman heiress was a chattel to be sold in marriage to the highest bidder. If one husband died she was up for sale again. Only the first of Matilda de Risle's husbands gives her anything back. His is the customary Saxon morning gift -- the present to a wife if her lord finds her sexually pleasing on their wedding night. Matilda's morning gift was Dungesey in the Fens..."a bolt hole my, dear somewhere to hide should trouble come." And come it does. As the war between King Stephen and Empress Matilda in the 1140s tears England apart, Matilda de Risle has to fight for her land, her son's safety--and her own life. Matilda, snobbish, bossy, inquisitive, realistic, competitive, and tough, is at once a powerful and endearing central character in Diana Norman's splendid new novel of medieval English life. It is set in a barbarous civil war and is by turns violent and very funny. Above all it fills the pages with real people, with the scents of the Fens in all seasons, and tells in the end a heartwrenching love story." This blurb really tells why I've enjoyed the two Diana Norman books I've tried so far. The characters are real. Sometimes noble and wonderful and sometimes pettish and jealous. You might get mad with them but you can understand why they act as they do. She has a delicious, subtle sense of humor which had me laughing out loud several times. Her research appears to be meticulous but is never hurled at us in chunks just to prove she did it. Plus it's not too disgusting in portraying medieval life. And I love the way she doesn't hit you over the head and take you by the hand to lead you to these facts. She also makes religion an integral part of the story. Things which may put some people off. The heroine is fourteen when the story starts, not unusual for medieval child brides. It spans a 20 year period of time. The heroine is married three times before she finally hooks up with the hero. It's more a historical novel with a romance threaded through it then a true romantic historical. Finding out about life in the Fens, the marshland around Ely in Cambridgeshire, was fascinating. How they lived, what they ate, how they hunted and wove reeds to provide things needed for day to day life. And watching the clash between Norman and Saxon showed how the two sides were still settling in. It's a detailed snapshot of the era and one I thoroughly enjoyed. A- Here is the full sentence from which the blurb quote is taken: "I just wanted, my dear, for you to have a bolthole, somewhere to hide should trouble come, where you and our children will always be safe and hidden and have plenty to eat. I know it seems an odd little gift to you and it will take time to get used to its people--these are the true English and nobody is odder than they--but I shall feel happier that you have it."

Panoramic Romantic History

A wonderful story of survival amidst a political war torn backdrop. It is more romantic history than historical romance. It is not a happy ending; it is a fitting ending to a story filled with strong will and strong emotion. It leaves you happy for the heroine. Unforgettable!

A great book!

This is one of my all time favorite books. I have reread it many times with a great deal of pleasure. It concerns the life of a young Norman heiress named Matilda who is sold off to one husband after another during the violent times of the civil war between King Steven and the Empress Maud. Matilda's first husband presents her with a "morning gift" after their wedding night. She is dismayed at this display of lusty feeling on his part and mortified to think anyone might imagine she is capable of the same feelings. Then she is further dismayed to find that this gift is a swampy bit of fenland in East Anglia where no one speaks her proper Norman French. But it is a rich land filled with sassy, dependable people and it's a great place to hide in times of trouble and trouble is surely coming!