Act of Mercy: A Sister Fidelma Mystery FROM THE PUBLISHER
"In the late autumn of A.D. 666, Fidelma of Cashel - an advocate of the Brehon Courts, sister to the King of Cashel, and religieuse of the Celtic Church - is at a crossroads. Needing to reflect upon her commitment to the religious life and her relationship to the Saxon monk Eadulf, she leaves Eadulf and joins a small band sailing from Ireland on a pilgrimage to the Shrine of St. James, in modern-day Spain. Her first surprise onboard is the appearance of Cian, her first love, a man who deserted her ten years ago, and who stirs up memories she'd rather forget." As if this wasn't complication enough, on the first night out the ship is tossed by a turbulent sea and a pilgrim disappears, apparently washed overboard. But the appearance of a blood-stained robe raises the possibility of murder and death continues to dog the tiny band of pilgrims trapped within the close confines of the ship. Battling against the antagonism of her fellow pilgrims, Fidelma is determined to solve this most perplexing of puzzles before the ship reaches the shrine and the killer, if there is one, disappears forever.
FROM THE CRITICS
Kirkus Reviews
The intrepid Sister Fidelma is at sea-aboard the Barnacle Goose on pilgrimage to the Shrine of St. James and afloat a thousand of her own musings, religious and secular. Before the seventh-century sleuth (The Monk Who Vanished, 2001, etc.) can sort through her conflicting professional and personal roles, she's overwhelmed by bickering among disagreeable shipmates and the dumbfounding reappearance after ten years of her first love. Once a dashing warrior who cruelly betrayed Fidelma's girlish heart, Cian now affects religious garb that hasn't curbed his womanizing ways. Indeed, he seems the center of a high-seas web of wanton lust that will leave bodies piled up to the water-line. Investigator Fidelma can't avoid being drawn into the wake of questions following the disappearance of Sister Muirgel during a storm: How could such a seasick young woman have had the strength to haul herself on deck to be swept over? But what respectable murderer would have left behind her bloody robe? Virtually every pilgrim aboard this ship of fools has been entangled with the promiscuous daughter of a nasty noble; now Fidelma must keep her wooden world safe enough from shipwreck and Saxon slavers to investigate. The sea voyage is epic and some of the cast grandiose, but the scale here is mock-heroic, the sins petty, and the murderer predictable. Though Fidelma emerges as more human than before, the loose ends in the rigging are realistic in all the wrong ways, especially when clearing suspects relies so much on looks of blank astonishment.
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