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Rating: 
Summary: Medieval Tale Set in a Haunted Church
Review: A group of pilgrims is travelling from London to the holy shrine at Canterbury. As they stop to spend each night along the way, a different member of the group takes a turn telling a tale to pass the evening. This is the Poor Priest's Tale, and what a great ghost story it is! The group has stopped to spend the night in the ruin of a church in an abandoned village, and, of course, the Priest's tale is set in a similar church.
The ghost story takes place in the English town of Scawsby, which is located near the southeastern coast of England. In the year 1308, a band of warrior knights of the Templar order mysteriously disappeared on the moors near Scawsby, and it's rumored that the knights were transaporting a fabulous treasure. The main character in the ghost story is a priest named Phillip, who is assigned to the church in Scawsby, only to learn that the last four priests who held that position before him all went mad. In fact, his immediate predessor hung himself from a tree. Father Phillip finds that there are haunting eyes painted all over the church, and he and his brother (a fellow priest) hear mysterious voices chanting "We are watching you, we are always watching you." Phillip tries to get to the bottom of the mystery, so the people of Scawsby can be freed from the ghostly haunting.
Authoer Doherty did a great job with the medieval setting. There were a few unfamiliar words that came straing out of Medieval usage, which added to the period charm of the story. This was one of the best ghost stories I've read in a long time!
Rating:
Summary: Absorbing
Review: A totally absorbing "atmosphere" book. I literally couldn't put it down --- Its got everything a history, mystery and horror fan could want...Ghosts of Templar Knights, a forbidden bog, a town with a terrible secret, and a curious new clergyman trying to piece it all together in 14th century England. A great "escape" or vacation read.
Rating:
Summary: Absorbing
Review: A totally absorbing "atmosphere" book. I literally couldn't put it down --- Its got everything a history, mystery and horror fan could want...Ghosts of Templar Knights, a forbidden bog, a town with a terrible secret, and a curious new clergyman trying to piece it all together in 14th century England. A great "escape" or vacation read.
Rating: 
Summary: Medieval Mayhem and Murder
Review: If you like murder mysteries as well as historical fiction, then you are in for a treat. Mr. Doherty knows the medieval period and uses it to good advantage. This is a takeoff of Chaucer's Canterbury tales where all the members of the party tell a story. This is the Story told by the Priest. It is a tale of treachery, greed and ghosts. This novel was wonderfully done and quite enjoyable.
Rating:
Summary: Medieval Mayhem and Murder
Review: If you like murder mysteries as well as historical fiction, then you are in for a treat. Mr. Doherty knows the medieval period and uses it to good advantage. This is a takeoff of Chaucer's Canterbury tales where all the members of the party tell a story. This is the Story told by the Priest. It is a tale of treachery, greed and ghosts. This novel was wonderfully done and quite enjoyable.
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Summary: A gripping tale told in a delightfully frighful manner!
Review: It's a pilgrimage you won't want to miss! P.C. Doherty adds one more pilgrim's tale in "Ghostly Murders" to the three previously published and in this series the author definitely makes the literary journey worthwhile. Doherty's entourage is the same 31 that Geoffrey Chaucer assembled in Southwark in London in "The Canterbury Tales" who are on their pilgrimage to pay respects to the martyred St. Thomas a Becket at his shrine in Canterbury in 1389. From one's own British literature knowledge, the reader knows that each member is required to tell four tales, two going and two returning. In this series of mysteries, Doherty portrays the travelers much as Chaucer originally did and it is amusing reading to discover how he weaves Chaucer into this modern day re-telling. Of course, Chaucer died before all 124 tales could be "told," and so perhaps this is Doherty's way of completing the series. Doherty does not write in rhyming couplets and his narrative prose moves much more quickly; after all, Chaucer set out to tell his tales and each was required to possess a moral. Doherty doesn't seem quite so obsessed. A fifth tale by Doherty, however, has not appeared. In "Ghostly Murders" ("The Poor Priest's tale of mystery and murder as he goes on pilgrimage from London to Canterbury"), the author features Father Philip, who, along with his brother Edmund, has just been assigned his first parish in the village of Scawsby in Kent. That village has held a long, and evil, mystery dealing with the Knights Templars, a holy relic, rumors of lost treasure, evil incarnate, and, of course, a murder or two. By the end of the book, Father Philip "had learned a great deal, in his short stay at Scawsby, about good and evil, about the human will and the need to repair what was broken, for man to answer for what he did." This is quite an interesting series. Doherty writes under other names as well: Michael Clynes, Paul Harding, Anna Apostolou, to name three. Where he has time to be head-master of a school in London is beyond this reader, but we're glad he makes the time to write his books--they're all worth the read!
Rating:
Summary: first class historical mystery AND ghost story
Review: not only is this is avery good historical mytsery, full of insightful and interesting detail, but it is also a rather chilling ghost story. the writing is succinct and evocative (if not particularly artful). Doherty's prose is very readable, and the characters he draws are very real, especially Philip the Priest, the man at the centre of this spectrely tale. The plot is great, and it has a couple of really nice twists and unexpected shocks. It moves very quickly, and doesnt get bogged down at all in any unueccessary detail. Every single sentence is germaine to the plot. If you like authentic-feeling historical mysteries, this is a good book to choose. (Pleasingly, it is now merely one in a series of six similar tales.) And, if you like ghost stories, this is a good choice, especially if you want a nice spin to the story.
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Summary: One of the best ghost stories that I've ever read.
Review: This pilgrim series of P.C. Doherty is truly excellent! In this story, we have the story provided by the Poor Priest and his brother the Ploughman. The group of pilgrims have been forced to spend the night in a ruined church, and the Poor Priest tells his story about another derelict church and the strange happenings there. Through the course of the story we are told about an ancient order of Templar knights, murder, mayhem and evil. Reparation and cleansing must be done in order to rid the small village of Scawsby of a terrible curse that has lasted for generations. This is one book that I found it hard to put down. What a wonderful story!
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