Joyce Elson Moore, The Tapestry Shop

The Tapestry Shop

Joyce Elson Moore

Five Star, Nov 5 2010, $25.95

ISBN: 9781594148996

In 1265 in Arras, France, twenties something Citizen Adam de la Halle is accused of helping people avoid paying their taxes. Although a king favorite for his chansons and satirical comedic plays, he still is found guilty and sent away from his city in exile for a few months. Upon his return to Arras, he knows his first action is to find the thieving hangman who took his money and much more from his soul.

Adam heads to Paris to study at the university, but is distracted when he meets courageous Catherine, daughter of a Tapestry shopkeeper. She is deeply pious while he feels the Church's hypocritical intolerance towards Jews and Catha's is unacceptable. When she joins the crusade to free the Holy Land, he must decide between joining his beloved or ending their relationship before it begins as he knows having been married that love failed him once before.

This is a great medieval biographical fiction of the author of the first known Robin Hood tale. The story line brings to life this key but little known author and performer who allegedly wrote the first non religious French mystical, Le Jeu Robin et Marion (circa 1280 approximately). Fans will feel they rode one of the tapestries to late thirtieth century France as Joyce Elson Moore provides a spotlight on an intriguing era in Arras and Paris as women went on Crusades and more so introducing to fans of historical literature a fascinating pioneering writer.

Harriet Klaussner