The Last Templar

The Last Templar (1995) Michael Jecks

This was an interesting book. The mystery was good, the story was good, and I quite liked the historical setting and the history lesson. The writing was, for the most part, very good, with one glaring exception. In this book Michael Jecks switches point of view abruptly and sometimes painfully. I was confused several times when I thought the point of view was one character when it had switched to the point of view of another characters.

Despite this glaring annoyance, it was still a good book and an interesting read. As he has written an entire series, my hope is that this part of his writing style improves as he continues to write, and also that he found an editor who was willing to fix these issues. I have books two and three in this series, and how this point of view issue resolves will determine whether I’ll read any more of the series.

But as I said, the story was very good, and I found the history fascinating.

Set in the early 14th century, the Knights Templar have just be disbanded and hounded throughout France as heretics. The books starts with a bit of this history, as seen from the point of view of a monk who escapes the Inquisition.

We then switch to England, where Simon Puttock has just been appointed bailiff of Lynford Castle. There is an interesting bit on precisely what a bailiff does, which I quite liked, since I imagined a bailiff as something else entirely. Although the transition between these two parts of the book was that abrupt, it didn’t bother me, as the Templar bits were in the Prologue, and were a nice introduction to the time as well as to some of the methods of the Inquisition.

Simon meets Sir Baldwin Furnshill, newly returned to the area, and both end up investigating the a murder in one of the villages in the area where Simon is now bailiff.

Michael Jecks does, to me, a good job describing like in the 14th century, making it far less glamorous than some historical novels, and much fantasy, would have us believe. The description of the buildings, including the differences between houses with and without chimneys, I enjoyed. I am also curious as to whether the historical detail in this book is as accurate as I am hoping it is. After all, if you are recreating a specific time period, one would hope that you’d do so accurately.

So, the first book is good, although not great. We’ll see how the next to turn out.
Rating: 6/10

• Browse the archives:
  
• Cold Service » »
• « « The Dragonstone