The Angel Knight - Susan King ~Review in English~

The Angel Knight by Susan King

Blurb:

Burning her own Scottish castle to prevent the English from claiming it, Lady Christian MacGillean knows that the enemy wants the treasure hidden in its ruins. Soon captured and imprisoned in an iron cage, she is on the brink of death when an English knight claims her—and her lands.

Stunned by the cruel treatment of the beautiful Scottish rebel, Sir Gavin Faulkener demands her release, but the king has a price: the hidden gold of Kilglassie Castle. When the dying girl unexpectedly recovers in his keeping, Gavin fears the exposure of his secret—a mystical healing gift. Honor-bound to claim the missing treasure, Gavin discovers the lady’s castle a smoking ruin inhabited by rebels—while Lady Christian takes up her cause of rebellion again. Yet even as old threats arise, passion and love grow—and the deepest wounds of all begin to heal.

This book had me spellbound from the first page on. It is an enchanting mixture of the rough, hard reality of Scotland in the early 14th century and  and the people living there, many of them victims of the conflict between King Edward and Robert Bruce. Especially many of the  female relations of the Bruce suffered terribly at the hands of the king when he got hold of them.

This is  why our hero Sir Gavin Faulkener sees our heroine, a close relation of the Bruce’s for the first time when he is standing in front of a cage, attached to the outside wall of the parapet of Carlisle Castle, in the middle of winter, where she has been caged since September. Even though Gavin does not care for the King’s policies in Scotland and has been disgraced because of it before, he is granted Kilglassie castle, Lady Christian’s home, as a test of his loyalty. Lady Christian MacGillan herself is dying due to the exposure to the elements in her cage. As the king still hopes to obtain information about an ancient treasure hidden at Kilglassie Castle from her he allows Gavin to take Lady Christian away and wed her, ”last minute”, so to say, in order to get the information for his king before Lady Christian dies.

Getting her out of the cage proves to be the easiest part, keeping her alive, even when she has conquered her illness, will keep Gavion on his toes and he will need all the help he can get…

The brutal reality of Scotland in the Late Middle Ages, combined with some wonderful, complex and extremely charming characters with a healthy dose of mystical elements and a nice sweet dose of romance just to spice things up make for an educational, interesting and absolutely fascinating read that kept me enthralled right till the end. I really really loved this book. This is one of the books that I started rereading right after I had read the last page.

Having finished reading it I found myself trying to find out more about the history of those times and the fate of those mentioned in the book that were real characters and I found myself thinking and dreaming about those that weren’t.

A wonderful and well written book that I can definitely recommend!

*I received a copy of this book from eBook Discovery in exchange for an honest review.*

  ★★★★★