Recently I read a mystery by Sarah Smith called The Vanished Child. Though written in 1992 the novel reads as though it were written at the turn of the 20th century – the period in which it is set. Her use of language works to draw the reader into that time and place so well, I marveled at her skill. With her latest Medieval Claudia Dain has achieved almost the same effect. I don’t think any modern writer could truly write a novel that exactly mimicked the tone and style of a fictional Medieval work in fact, I’m not sure there ever was such a thing – but Dain comes darn close.

Nicolaa is a wealthy woman in 12th century England. As such she is much in demand as a bride. So in demand that she has been married four times in arrangements made by King Henry. Each marriage fell apart when the men didn’t get what they expected, and because of his own situation the King has been sympathetic enough to work out ways to end those marriages. Now he has sent a fourth prospective groom and Nicolaa is once again faced with a husband she doesn’t want.

Rowland d’Albret of Aquitaine is the man ordered to marry and take control of the properties Nicolaa holds. Whereas Nicolaa is resigned, Rowland would like nothing more then to return the gift of wife and properties to King Henry II. He lost his great love, Lubias, and cannot imagine taking another woman as wife and lover, but his feelings change when he meets Nicolaa. He’s still not convinced he can ever feel anything because of his deep yearning for Lubias, but he’s believes Nicolaa has endured a great deal and determines to make things right for her. She’s just as determined to keep her feelings and her life to herself. Her first marriage was one she tried to make work. When she proved barren and the marriage ended, she was hurt. When the succeeding marriages failed, that hurt had nowhere to go. Now all she wants is care for the people in her keeping and to feel nothing.

Every word and sentence in this novel is carefully chosen. I wasn’t even sure how Dain was doing it, but she puts the reader into that time and place like no other author I’ve read. The pacing is right, as is the word selection – especially what these characters say and think. When Rowland is told that Nicolaa is barren and that he should not marry her, all he can think of is what she has already been put through. They face each other for the first time and each small thought is appropriate to who and what and when these people are.

She saw no offense in his gaze as they stared into each other’s eyes. He allowed her to look as he himself was looking. Perhaps a fair man then?

Nay, ‘twas too soon for such a hope. If a man was fair in his dealings, he kept such practice in the company of men. No woman would be granted such consideration. “I will deal gently, Nicolaa,” he said, his voice as soft as carded wool. The words, the words of promise, whispered against the tattered edge of her soul. What a promise it was, to be treated gently.

Like the Renee Zellweger character in Jerry Maguire who tells Jerry, “you had me at hello” (a line I personally hate), Ms. Dain had me from page one. Her prose and her certainty about who these people are leapt off the page. Everything was just right.

As strong as the prose is, the author began to lose me with the protagonist’s seemingly endlessly repetitive problems. It’s interesting and, again, appropriate for Rowland’s great love of Lubias to be used by Nicolaa’s friends and family as proof that he can love and is therefore a great prospect as husband. In fact his great love has made him a legend, since love in a relationship could was generally only to be heard of in songs and stories and rarely existed in their reality. But to be told over and over again of this great love was not only painful for Nicolaa but tedious for the reader. He yearns, he longs, he loves only Lubias. It’s important that the reader know this to understand and see his development, but to be told on every other page was almost laughable.

Nicolaa’s inability to trust a man with her life is handled more adroitly in The Willing Wife, but it too suffers as a plot point because of the frequent mentions and lack of progress in the storytelling. These people are stuck, like broken records. That’s a problem in this otherwise stellar effort. One that could have lost me completely if not for the author’s amazing use of language and how she uses it to create this world and these people.