Thursday, September 27, 2007

New Slain Knight-Deborah Gabrien

New Slain Knight
Deborah Gabrien
Dunne, Nov 2007, $24.95
ISBN: 9780312374006

A three week vacation with her lover is disturbed when his sister calls musician Ringan Laine to ask her to watch her daughter for two weeks. His significant lover Penny Wintercraft-Hawkes does not mind that Rebecca is going to be with them; she suggests they go to Cornwell. Ringan arranges for them to stay with his friend and fellow musician Gowan Cambourne. He makes Penny feel uncomfortable and she and Becca share the same vision when the song NEW SLAIN KNIGHT is played.

Gowan confesses that his lover committed suicide in the house and that Rebecca reminds him of a younger version of her. Becca performs NEW SLAIN KNIGHT with Gowan’s band and has a vision of his ancestors who lived five centuries ago insisting murder, suicide and rape occurred. Before something deadly happens, a concerned Ringan takes his two women to Tintagell, but the visions continue. Only the truth about what happened in 1451 will free Becca and Penny.

The latest “Haunted ballad” mystery is a ghost story that transports the mediums into a tragedy that happened centuries ago; in turn this enables the audience to experience the pain and heartache that led to crimes occurring and an inability to live with the consequences of what they wrought. The danger to the modern females is palpable as each vision and flashback seems more vivid than the previous one as if those long dead are trying to redo their errors through Penny and Rebecca. Deborah Gabrien spellbinds her fans with this tense ghost story.

Harriet Klausner

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