Welcome back to Mustard Seed Botanicals Blog. We have author Eric Reed here today discussing the book The Guardian Stones.
The Guardian Stones is a dark mystery set during World War Two in Noddweir, a remote Shropshire village situated near the Welsh border. Hidden among forested mountains, Noddweir's inhabitants include Martha Roper, a countrywoman of advanced years. Styling herself a wise woman, she uses her knowledge of medicinal plants to cure ailments and for other purposes as a service to the village, as had her mother, grandmother, and the wise women in her family for generations before that.
Her knowledge is of great interest to American professor Edwin Carpenter, who has come to the village to study the Guardian Stones, the ancient stone circle brooding over Noddweir. He interviews Martha Roper on more than one occasion, hearing her comments on natural remedies and preventitives handed down from mother to daughter over the decades. For
example, wearing a necklace of vervain serves as an anti-headache measure, hiccoughs can be cured with lemon juice -- if the sufferer can manage to obtain a lemon in 1941! -- carrying a potato in a pocket is a sovereign measure against rheumatism, and that raspberry tea makes a soothing gargle.
Not surprisingly, the elderly countrywoman is also knowledgeable about widespread beliefs involving plants and trees, such as the necessity to avoid eating blackberries in October -- because it is the month when the devil gets into them -- and the well-known cure for a wart by rubbing it with a piece of bacon and then secreting the latter in a slit in the bark of an ash tree, transferring the blemish to the tree.
It is Martha who tells Professor Carpenter about local folklore surrounding the titular stone circle and recites a childrens' rhyme about the circle that explains, in part, how the villagers view the Guardian Stones. It runs as follows:
Time stands still
On Guardians Hill
Circle round
Unholy ground
The Guardians dwell
In deepest hell
Don't go alone
Inside the stones
That surmount still
Guardians Hill
Not revealed, however, or at least not until now is that the authors were sly enough to slip a couple of clues into a conversation about herbs, information which will play a part in the denouement -- or maybe not. We'll leave it to readers to decide.
Sounds like a very intriguing book with characters that I'd be interested in reading about.
The Guardian Stones is a dark mystery set during World War Two in Noddweir, a remote Shropshire village situated near the Welsh border. Hidden among forested mountains, Noddweir's inhabitants include Martha Roper, a countrywoman of advanced years. Styling herself a wise woman, she uses her knowledge of medicinal plants to cure ailments and for other purposes as a service to the village, as had her mother, grandmother, and the wise women in her family for generations before that.
Her knowledge is of great interest to American professor Edwin Carpenter, who has come to the village to study the Guardian Stones, the ancient stone circle brooding over Noddweir. He interviews Martha Roper on more than one occasion, hearing her comments on natural remedies and preventitives handed down from mother to daughter over the decades. For
example, wearing a necklace of vervain serves as an anti-headache measure, hiccoughs can be cured with lemon juice -- if the sufferer can manage to obtain a lemon in 1941! -- carrying a potato in a pocket is a sovereign measure against rheumatism, and that raspberry tea makes a soothing gargle.
Not surprisingly, the elderly countrywoman is also knowledgeable about widespread beliefs involving plants and trees, such as the necessity to avoid eating blackberries in October -- because it is the month when the devil gets into them -- and the well-known cure for a wart by rubbing it with a piece of bacon and then secreting the latter in a slit in the bark of an ash tree, transferring the blemish to the tree.
It is Martha who tells Professor Carpenter about local folklore surrounding the titular stone circle and recites a childrens' rhyme about the circle that explains, in part, how the villagers view the Guardian Stones. It runs as follows:
Time stands still
On Guardians Hill
Circle round
Unholy ground
The Guardians dwell
In deepest hell
Don't go alone
Inside the stones
That surmount still
Guardians Hill
Not revealed, however, or at least not until now is that the authors were sly enough to slip a couple of clues into a conversation about herbs, information which will play a part in the denouement -- or maybe not. We'll leave it to readers to decide.
Sounds like a very intriguing book with characters that I'd be interested in reading about.
Let's get to know the author.
Eric Reed is Mary Reed and Eric Mayer, co-authors of the John, Lord Chamberlain, historical mystery series set in 6th century Byzantium. Murder in Megara, its eleventh entry, was published in October 2015 by Poisoned Pen Press. The Guardian Stones, a World War Two mystery set in rural Shropshire, England, appeared in January 2016 from the same publisher. You can connect with the author online here: Website Blog
Eric Reed is Mary Reed and Eric Mayer, co-authors of the John, Lord Chamberlain, historical mystery series set in 6th century Byzantium. Murder in Megara, its eleventh entry, was published in October 2015 by Poisoned Pen Press. The Guardian Stones, a World War Two mystery set in rural Shropshire, England, appeared in January 2016 from the same publisher. You can connect with the author online here: Website Blog
You can find out more about The Guardian Stones:
1941 Britain: Children are vanishing from the village. Is it the powers of an ancient stone circle at work, or a modern predator?
In mid-1941, children evacuated to the remote Shropshire village of Noddweir to escape the Blitz begin to vanish. It was not uncommon for city children faced with rural rigors to run away. But when retired
American professor Edwin Carpenter, pursuing his study of standing stones, visits the village and discovers bloody clothing in the forest, it is clear there is a more sinister explanation.
The village constable is away on military duty so the investigation falls to his daughter Grace. Some villagers see the hand of German infiltrators bent on terror. The superstitious, mindful of the prehistoric stone circle gazing down on Noddweir, are convinced malevolent supernatural powers are at work. And Edwin, determined to help Grace find whatever predator is in play, runs into widespread
resentment over America’s refusal to enter the war.
This atmospheric mystery will appeal to readers of Rennie Airth, Maureen
Jennings, and both Ann Cleeves and Ann Granger.
You can find the book online here:
Amazon B & N Poisoned Pen Press
Thank you so much for guesting today. We enjoyed learning more about your book and the herbal remedies used by your characters.
Hope you all can stay for a bit to chat with our guest.
1941 Britain: Children are vanishing from the village. Is it the powers of an ancient stone circle at work, or a modern predator?
In mid-1941, children evacuated to the remote Shropshire village of Noddweir to escape the Blitz begin to vanish. It was not uncommon for city children faced with rural rigors to run away. But when retired
American professor Edwin Carpenter, pursuing his study of standing stones, visits the village and discovers bloody clothing in the forest, it is clear there is a more sinister explanation.
The village constable is away on military duty so the investigation falls to his daughter Grace. Some villagers see the hand of German infiltrators bent on terror. The superstitious, mindful of the prehistoric stone circle gazing down on Noddweir, are convinced malevolent supernatural powers are at work. And Edwin, determined to help Grace find whatever predator is in play, runs into widespread
resentment over America’s refusal to enter the war.
This atmospheric mystery will appeal to readers of Rennie Airth, Maureen
Jennings, and both Ann Cleeves and Ann Granger.
You can find the book online here:
Amazon B & N Poisoned Pen Press
Thank you so much for guesting today. We enjoyed learning more about your book and the herbal remedies used by your characters.
Hope you all can stay for a bit to chat with our guest.