The Sunne In Splendour by Sharon Kay Penman

The Brothers of Gwynedd covers more or less the same ground that Penman's Wales trilogy does, albeit more economically: the omnibus edition of all four books runs only 821 pages, while Penman's trilogy takes up a whopping 1,876 pages. (As further testament to my book hoarder credentials, I've got Edith Pargeter's The Brothers of Gwynedd tetralogy - comprising Sunrise in the West, The Dragon at Noonday, The Hounds of Sunset, and Afterglow and Nightfall - on my shelf, but I've yet to read it. But it is Llewelyn ap Gruffydd whom the Welsh call Ein Llyw Olaf - Our Last Leader' ( The Reckoning, p.

1240) Falls the Shadow, 1988, which deals mainly with Simon de Montfort V, Earl of Leicester, who revolted against his brother-in-law, England's Henry III in the middle of the 13th century and is sometimes (at least somewhat erroneously, IMHO) cited as the 'grandfather' of England's Parliament ( his father, Simon de Montfort IV, was a noted campaigner on the Catholic Church's side of the Albigensian Crusade) and The Reckoning, 1991, which treats with Llewelyn ap Gruffydd (Llewelyn, son of Griffith) and Davydd ap Gruffydd (David, son of Griffith), who was the first person executed in England for rebelling against the king, the thoroughly distasteful Edward Longshanks himself, Edward Plantagenet, known to history as Edward I (apparently all king names were renumbered after the Conquest: England's previously most celebrated ruler named Edward, styled 'The Confessor,' was Edward III) as Penman concludes in her author's note to The Reckoning, 'Davydd ap Gruffydd was the last Welsh-born Prince of Wales. I'd previously read (and mostly enjoyed) her Wales trilogy: Here Be Dragons, 1985, which concerns the Welsh ruler Llewelyn Fawr (Llewelyn the Great, b.

Uvula_fr_b4I finished reading Sharon Kay Penman's first published novel, The Sunne in Splendour (NY: Ballantine Books 1982 trade paperback edition first published January 1990 936 pps., including author's note ISBN: 3-2) on Wednesday, 5 January.

The Sunne In Splendour by Sharon Kay Penman