THE EDGE ON THE SWORD
Rebecca Tingle, . . Putnam, $19.99 (277pp) ISBN 978-0-399-23580-1
Medieval history buffs will be enthralled byTingle's first novel. The author sets her tale in the late 800s and imagines the formative years of an actual historic figure, the West Saxon King Alfred's oldest child (a daughter), Æthelflæd. Heavily saturated with political and military strategy, it will likely hold boys' attention as well as girls. Fifteen-year-old Flæd's life becomes endangered when she is betrothed to Ethelred, chief aldorman of Mercia, because enemies opposed to the union start plotting against both royal families. Flæd escapes one kidnapping, but later, on her way to Mercia to wed Ethelred, a pack of raiders attack her party. Flæd must employ all she's learned about battle from books, her father and her faithful guard, Red. In this meticulously researched novel, which alludes to the poem
Reviewed on: 07/02/2001
Genre: Children's