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The Magic of Camelot

The Magic of Camelot

List Price: $27.95
Your Price: $27.95
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 5 stars
Summary: The Magic of Camelot
Review: I found this book to be very good. It starts off with 20 or 30 pages of background material on the main character Isabel in first person. She is supposed to be Mordred's wife, and an enchanter as well. There are a lot of names, and most of them begin with M or G so it is a little difficult to keep it all straight. After this, the book starts to move, and gets faster and faster as it goes. What I really enjoyed was that it incorporated many of the lesser known legends about Camelot - like Gingalin, Launfal, Balin, Arthur's other children and the feud between the children of Lot and Pellinore - alongside staple characters such as Lancelot, Guinivere, Mordred, Merlin, Gawain and Arthur. The book encompasses Isabel's childhood and then twenty years in Camelot, and really does a great job of showing how she starts off as a shy, naive country girl to eventually become jaded and weary with the politics and tragedy that comes with life among royalty, knights and magic. It is very, very good, and there is a really creative twist at the end that explains the conflicting accounts of Camelot legends and why Camelot has never been found by archaeologists.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Return to the Magic of Camelot
Review: In the THE MAGIC OF CAMELOT, the reader is introduced to Isabel, a natural-born witch, chosen to the bride of Mordred, the illegitimate son of King Arthur and his half-sister Morgause. The very first pages reveal Isabel's early childhood, from the moment she was taken from her biological parents to growing up as the adopted daughter of Margause, then later raised and tutored by the enchantress Morgan le Fey. You will see the attachments Isabel formed for her foster brothers, Gawain, Gaheris, Agravain, Gareth and of course, Mordred. The marriage between Isabel and Mordred was an intense encompassing all-consuming love that survived the ups and downs one could imagine with all the political intrigues, maneuverings and magical influences that bore down on them. After her marriage, Isabel apprentices with and continues her studies under Merlin who after a while decided she was ready to become Arthur's advisor. After that, she found herself embroiled in court politics that further strained her marriage to Mordred.

Told in the first person, in this expansively researched tome, the author paints a vivid picture of the sights, the sounds, the people, their clothing, food, etc. Isabel also lends humor, both telling of some of her feeble attempts at magic in her younger days and coaxing other magical beings to do her bidding. In one instance, I chuckled quite a bit over her talk with Ajax the magical horse, as she negotiated with him to do her bidding. Then, in an aside, she would explain how horses were prone to flattery, but not very bright and likened them to `pretty cows with big egos'.

Although Isabel inserted levity wherever possible, there was also the drama from the carnage of the battles that were fought and the devastation and cruelties were vividly portrayed. You'll feel the love she had for her favorite pure and honorable knights, such as Arthur, Gaheris, Gareth, Galahad, Percival, and Bors and moved to tears for those she loved and lost. In addition, you'll probably look differently on the adultery of Queen Guinevere and Sir Lancelot as they cuckholded the very honorable King Arthur who for years, looked the other way rather than hold his beloved wife and friend accountable for treason. But more importantly, it humanizes Mordred who wasn't as bad as legends made him out to be.

*** For those who love the Arthurian legends of Camelot, the knights and their ladies, here is your chance to delve deeper into the machinations of court life in Camelot. Though I was rather intimidated by the size of the this book (TSP of 600+ pages) I found it to be an immensely enjoyable read that I can highly recommend to others who want to hear again the legends and experience the magic that was Camelot!

*** Marilyn, for www.historicalromancewriters.com ***



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