The Day of the Serpent

The tumultuous politics of Henry IV’s early reign propel Clark’s solid sequel to 2020’s The Hour of the Fox. In 1400, Sir Thomas Swynford, “stepbrother to the usurper king,” compels Brother Chandler, a perceptive and worldly London friar who serves as a reluctant spy for the House of Lancaster, to accompany him and his entourage on a mysterious journey north. Their destination turns out to be Pontefract Castle, where Richard II, the Plantagenet king deposed in 1399, is imprisoned. Chandler, whose job it is to care for the ailing Richard, is appalled by his treatment. When Richard dies, having “starved himself from melancholy,” Swynford and company head back to London with the king’s coffin. Along the way, a mysterious bowman picks off Swynford’s men one by one, and Chandler is ordered to find the killer. The search for the culprit, whose victims the reader knows little about, takes a back seat to factional plots in London, Chandler’s evolving sense of morality, and the mystery of forbidden books harbored by poet Geoffrey Chaucer, employer of Matilda, the friar’s love interest. Those who enjoy medieval stories of betrayal and ruthlessness will be rewarded. (Nov.)