The Subtle Serpent

Sister Fidelma #4

by Peter Tremayne

In the fourth book in this acclaimed Irish medieval mystery series, Sister Fidelma investigates a murder at a remote abbey, only to encounter the strange disappearance of a ship and its entire crew.

Genres: Mystery, Historical Fiction, Historical, Fiction, Historical Mystery, Ireland, Crime

320 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1996

About the author

Peter Berresford Ellis (born 10 March 1943) is a historian, literary biographer, and novelist who has published over 90 books to date either under his own name or his pseudonyms Peter Tremayne and Peter MacAlan. He has also published 95 short stories. His non-fiction books, articles and academic papers have made him acknowledged as an authority on Celtic history and culture. As Peter Tremayne, he is the author of the international bestselling Sister Fidelma mystery series. His work has appeared in 25 languages.

Reviews

[Jaline · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sister Fidelma of Kildare has been sent to the Abbey of the Salon of the Three Wells in her capacity as dálaigh to solve a mystery involving a body in one of the wells. As the barc, captained by Ross closes in on their destination, they see a large “ghost ship” cutting an odd course that will surely bring it to ruin on the rocks. They board the ship and find no-one aboard. Fidelma spots a few clues as she inspects the ship, but the most chilling of all is the discovery of a missal that she had given her good friend, Saxon monk Brother Eadulf of Seaxmund’s Ham, when they had parted a year earlier. She knew he would never willingly give up that book.

However, she had a mystery to solve – a murder. The Abbess Draigen is acting very strange and making some poor judgements despite being the one who asked for a Brehon. There are other disturbances as the various relationships between the Sisters of the Abbey and the fortress of Dún Boí come to light.

When a second murder occurs, Sister Fidelma experiences one of her biggest challenges ever: how to sift through all the false words and false trails that are so plentiful and try to find the elusive truths?

This 4th book of the Sister Fidelma series is a fascinating read. We are in 7th century Ireland and the author’s knowledge of this time, as well as the quotes from the literature of the time both enhances the atmosphere of this novel and shapes the characters.

When I first discovered this series 11 years ago, I was hooked on the history, the main characters, and was mesmerized by the laws of the time that governed the people. I read as many of the books in this series as I could find in the Library. However, it wasn’t until this series was released in the form of eBooks that I was once more able to join Sister Fidelma and Brother Eadulf on their adventures.

I am looking forward to catching up on books that I had previously missed in this series as well as re-reading some of them. Highly recommended for readers with an interest in ancient Ireland: even in the 7th Century during which these books are set, the legends and the lore from still more ancient times also play a role.

[Clemens Schoonderwoert · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read this book in 2011, and its the 5th, chronologically, volume of the wonderful "Sister Fidelma" series.

The year is now AD 666, and Sister Fidelma, Brehon and sister of King Colgú of Muman (Munster), is sent to the south-west coast of Muman, to investigate the death of a headless female corpse.

This corpse is found in a drinking well with the one hand a crucifix while in the other she holds a pagan death symbol.

On her way to this remote place, Sister Fidelma will encounter a lost ship off the Irish coast with its crew and cargo missing.

In her bid to discover the identity of this woman and that of the missing crew, Sister Fidelma will have to some cunning investigations to come with answers and conclusions.

What is to follow is an amazing Irish mystery, in which Sister Fidelma excels in unravelling this web of deceit, thread by thread, and after a superbly executed plot she will be able in a most convincing way to reveal the culprit behind these horrendous actions.

Highly recommended, for this is another brilliant addition to this tremendous series, and that's why I like to call this episode: "A Superb Subtle Serpent"!

[Mimi · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tremayne is a terrible writer and Sister Fidelma is practically perfect in every way. Despite those flaws it was a good read and I enjoyed the story.

[Johnny · Rating 3 out of 5]

Peter Tremayne doesn’t play fair in The Subtle Serpent, the fourth installment in the Sister Fidelma series. In Agatha Christie fashion, he doesn’t introduce important potential suspects until late in the game and ultimately fails in communicating the motive for the killing. Yes, he spells out the murderer’s (multiple murders in this one even as there are multiple mysteries to be solved) motive, but the murderer would have been well able to make the same assumption that Sister Fidelma makes at the end of the novel. So, that portion of the novel isn’t convincing.

What is convincing, however, is that Tremayne (whomever the real author behind the pseudonym) knows his ancient Irish law and tradition, as well as the significant differences between the Irish church and the Roman church. Having read several volumes on church history which dealt with the Roman church, I am personally finding ideas about celibacy of the clergy, relationship between ecclesiastical and secular law, and cohabited religious communities (conhospitae) to be quite enlightening and fascinating. In this novel, I particularly enjoyed the exposure of the false council proceedings distributed by the ambitious Archbishop Ultan (the same Ultan who gathered together the orphans after the Yellow Plague?) in which he was purporting that St. Patrick contradicted himself with regard to obeying secular law. It showed how even people of faith sometimes perpetrate fraud to advance their own ambition, turning off their intellectual honesty and pounding the idea of “faith” in a way that God never intended.

The texture of these novels is such that it constantly reminds me of how rusty my Latin has become, but helps me savor such lines as: “Valeat quatum valere potest” (value that for what it is worth) and “Ignis aurem probat, miseria fortes viros” (fire proves gold, difficulty/adversity [proves] strong men). The latter is from Seneca and I like it a lot. It is a very valuable truth that is affirmed by several biblical passages.

Another aspect of this novel series that I truly enjoy is the character of Sister Fidelma herself. The sister of a king, an appointee as a Brehon, and a religieuse herself, this woman is well-versed in many different disciplines. She knows of diplomacy, such forensics as existed in the period, law, and theology. Yet, all of these ingredients are mixed together in a broth of understanding. As a result, she seems both superior to some and more human than other detectives found in the mystery genre (whether on-screen or on the page).

This novel begins with a body in a well, raises the stakes with an empty vessel drifting on the high seas, ups the ante considerably with a missing person incident, adds to the pot with potential treason, and offers other deaths before the conclusion. The novel certainly offers a number of problems to solve and lines of questioning to follow. To me, that makes for an intriguing mystery but—as stated before—a somewhat dissatisfying conclusion. It won’t stop me from reading more in this marvelous world of my Irish heritage, however.

[Carolyn Rose · Rating 4 out of 5]

Set at an interesting time when women had more rights than they would for many centuries to come. I wanted more little details about food and clothing and jobs within the abbey.

[MaryJo Dawson · Rating 4 out of 5]

The unique background for the Sister Fidelma mysteries is ancient Ireland. This is a portion of Irish history that is obviously near and dear to the author's heart, and it was fascinating to me. Our heroine lives in a time period before the history that most of the the rest of us know anything about, other than that St. Patrick arrived on that Isle and what the result was.
It is a time when women had not yet been related to the back pew or the convent by the church. Sister Fidelma is an educated woman from a prestigious family, who at a young age holds a position of legal authority. In this role she is sent to an abbey to investigate the discovery of a headless body in a well. During the course of her journey to the location her ship encounters a ship deserted at sea, upon arrival she finds that although the head abbess requested her investigation she is far from friendly, and the local lord and his companion make her uneasy.
The evil here and the answers to all of the mysteries will test all of Sister Fidelma's intellect, patience, and cleverness at deduction.
It was a very enjoyable puzzle for me, but beware; all of the old Celtic names can become confusing. Fortunately the author provides a list of principle characters at the beginning, which comes in very handy until the mind wraps itself around who's who.

[Jennie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. A bit long and wordy in places but the author has a way of writing that conjures up the scenes so that you can really visualize them-might make a nice PBS movie. Not many books send me to the internet to look up things mentioned in the book. This one did. I liked how the author, an historian on Celtic history, weaves in real events and real people into the fictional narrative without it being blatantly obvious. Kudos on this and I learned things-like how a water clock works and about the mores and structure of the secular Irish society before Catholic Rome screwed things up with their uptight sense of religious piety, etc (as they did when they imposed Christianity on other societies like the Maya). Intriguing story(ies). At times hard to put down. The names are at times difficult to pronounce but that only added to the story-set in 666 AD. Will read more of this series. (my first one).

[dOnnabud · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another fascinating Sister Fidelma tale. She is a wise and independent, courageous and strong character. I'm reading the series in chronological order. In addition to embarking on intriguing Sister Fidelma adventures, I always enjoy gaining insights into ancient Irish customs, especially the equality of women in all realms of society, before everything went to hell with the British occupation and oppression.

Tremayne's style is richly descriptive and compelling. One of my favorite passages (first edition 1998 hardcover): "Not even the sounds of the sea could be heard, so good a barrier were the tall oak trees, interspersed with protesting clumps of hazel trying to survive among their mighty and ancient brothers. There were whole clumps of strawberry trees with their toothed evergreen leaves, their short trunks and twisting branches rising twenty feet and more in height." (page 125)

[Kate · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fidelma travels to a remote abbey to solve the murder of a headless corpse suspended in a well - but also the apparent disappearance of Eadulf from a ship she’d no idea he was on. Fidelma continues irritatingly accomplished at all things, and smug as all get out, but these improve. I don’t try to work out the puzzles, I just wait for Fidelma’s summary at the end and work on considering the history that Tremayne shoves in.

[Joan · Rating 4 out of 5]

The best in the series so far. Engaging story. Interesting characters.

[Kathryn · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is the fourth volume in the mystery series about Sister Fidelma of Kildare, set in the seventh century in what is now Great Britian. She is red-headed, brooks no fools, and is also an anruth, the second highest rank in the Irish legal system, so she is both a dalaigh (an advocate in the courts of the Five Kingdoms of Éireann), and Celtic religieuse. In these books she sets her skills to uncovering the truth when there is mystery and murder.

Sister Fidelma has been called to an abbey in the far southwest corner of the Kingdom of Muman; at the abbey a headless naked woman has been found in the main well. On her coastal journey with Ross, a captain she knows well, they find a Gaulish merchant ship with no crew or passengers – just some ominous bloodstains. On board she also finds a book satchel, of the kind carried by religieuse; inside is a missal she had given to her friend, the Saxon monk Brother Eadulf, who she had last seen in Rome. When she gets to the quay for the Abbey of the Salmon of the Three Wells, she is met by both Abbess Draigen and Adnár, the bó-aire or local chieftain, in a race to see who can get to Fidelma first. The officious Abbess wins the race, and says that as she was the one who called for a dalaigh to investigate the murder, she wins. Adnár concedes, and Fidelma begins to investigate the murder (which soon turns into two murders), the very odd undercurrents of hatred and ambition at the Abbey, and the question of what has happened to Brother Eadulf.

I am enjoying this series, which is based in ancient Irish history, and look forward to reading the next book in the series.

[Aditya Sundararajan · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's my first venture into the Sister Fidelma series, and I was quite intrigued by the setting of a mystery in medieval Ireland. I enjoyed the author's nuanced ways of blending in Irish customs and the discrepancies of the churches into the story via character discourses. For a good majority of the book, the author takes his time to use the mystery as a fuel to soak us into the world, weaving his red herrings and the cast of eccentric characters. It's almost a character essay, and I enjoyed every bit of it. And then, in the third act when the other shoe starts to drop, Fidelma puts on her Miss Marple-esque hat, and all that magic just deflates.

It is, perhaps, this sudden change in the treatment of the story, narration-wise, that makes the final, customary detective-reveals-it-all speech tedious and convincing only in places. Fidelma is an astute observer and bright spirited, but I think the story could've used a more powerful manner of revelation in the end, something in line with the authorial voice that the book had at the start.

[Tammie Painter · Rating 3 out of 5]

I loved the history and research that went into this book. I've only read the first book in this series, but skipping ahead to #4 didn't present any problems, although it's clear I've missed out on some good stories I might have to catch up on.

The story starts out with the discovery of a decapitated corpse on the grounds of a religious community and the mystery unfolds of who she might be, who killed her, and why. It's a good mystery that has plenty of twists and turns, but does get a bit weighed down by several spots where it seems the author is rehashing history and information that's already been given more than once before. The final solution was a bit convoluted and not terribly surprising, but all in all it's a well written book that will appeal to anyone who loves Irish history and historical mysteries.

[Judy · Rating 3 out of 5]

It seems like there is more history here than in the others, and the plot is convoluted but logical. Includes clear descriptions of telling time with a clepsydra and of relevant ancient beliefs. A map and character list are included.

Here's a careful explanation that is important to this story. p 56:
"A fe, or rod of aspen, usually with an Ogham inscription was the measurement by which corpses and graves were calibrated. The fe was the tool of a mortician and was regarded with utmost horror so that no one, on any consideration, would take it in their hand or touch it, except of course, the person whose business it was to measure corpses and graves. A fe had been the symbol of death and ill-luck since the days of the old gods. Still the worst imprecation that could be uttered at any person was "May fe be soon measuring you."

[Lucielle · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have mixed feelings about this book.

On the one hand, the mystery is well-developed and intriguing, although some major clues are revealed only at the very end. That is truly what kept me going - I wanted to know how it ended.

I also liked the closed setting of a remote abbaye, where religion dwells with internal politics.

On the other hand, I really didn't like how the characters were developed, too one-sided, too obvious sometimes - and Fidelma's the worst, as I found her very obnoxious, when not rude for virtually no reason most of the time.

Without being a masterpiece, this book is a good read if you have nothing left.

[CJParker · Rating 5 out of 5]

Exciting, thrilling, twisting and turning plot, hard to put down, well written and plausible...greed is the downfall of humankind

[Paul · Rating 3 out of 5]

Two main plot threads are woven together well in this entertaining mystery.

[Rusty · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ancient Ireland in AD 666 is a fascinating location for the Sister Fidelma mysteries. In this novel, the fourth of a series, she is sent to the Abbey of the Salmon of Three Wells. In a peaceful setting in southwest corner of the country a murder has occurred. The Abbess Draigen has requested a dalaigh to investigate headless female body has found in one of the wells. A advocate of the Brehon law courts, Sister Fidelma is qualified to investigate.

The author often weaves two mysteries into the stories of Sister Fidelma, her friends and family. The same is true with this one for on the trip to the Abbey she finds a Gaulish merchant ship with neither crew nor cargo afloat in a bay. As she searches the ship she finds a missal that she had given her friend, Saxon monk Brother Eadulf of Seaxmund’s Ham, a year earlier. Is he among the missing? And, is the abandoned ship somehow connected to the murder at the Abbey?

At the Abbey, she encounters distrust and information with no bearing on the situation. Then a second murder occurs and the mystery deepens. A strong, intelligent and independent individual dedicated to pursuing the truth and locating the murder or murderers, Sister Fidelma is determined to uncover what really happened on the ship and why the murders were committed. .What she finds during her investigation is layers of hatred and animosity, political intrigues, prejudice, and greed which she must sift to find her answers. Excellent tale by a talented author who loves Celtic history.

[paper0r0ss0 · Rating 3 out of 5]

Una discreta sorpresa questo Tremayne tra i tanti scrittori di gialli storici. Non che si noti una particolare ambizione letteraria, ma una certa qualita' di scrittura non e' latitante come presso altri autori del genere. La trama gialla e' arzigogolata quanto basta e i personaggi risultano credibili nonostante il rischio di sabotarne l'accettabilita', specie quello della monaca investigatrice, personaggio principale. Le descrizioni storico-pasaggistiche, delle usanze e dei costumi, sono sempre interessanti. Unica nota di "demerito" e' l'accanimento per i nomi irlandesi profusi con troppa passione; uno non se li ricorda nemmeno facendoseli tatuare.

[Naomi Young · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well, the book was almost half-finished before the first evidence that the Roman Catholics were just sexist, depraved pervs compared to those wise, egalitarian Celtic Christians. So there's a record.

Strong principal characters, good puzzles, nice historical details vs. sermonizing and stereotyping of minor characters.

Hmmmm.

[Ilona · Rating 1 out of 5]

If you enjoy political history, you'll enjoy this book, but if, like me, your interest in history is more anthropological and sociological than political, you won't. I enjoyed the character of Sister Fidelma. I enjoyed the description of daily life in Ireland, year 665. But the long explanations of politics and warfare just left me cold, and I was unwilling to finish.

[Morgan Dhu · Rating 3 out of 5]

The fourth Sister Fidelma novel, The Subtle Serpent, opens with a double mystery. Fidelma is on her way to the religious community of The Salmon of the Three Wells, located within the kingdom of her brother King Colgu, to investigate the murder of an unknown woman - her body found naked, headless, in a well, clutching a simple cross. While en route, the ship she is travelling on encounters an abandoned Gaullish merchant ship. Her cargo holds are empty, there are signs of blood recently shed, and perhaps worst of all, in one of the cabins Fidelma finds a book she had given as a gift to her dear companion of earlier adventures, Brother Eadulf.

As Fidelma seeks to solve both mysteries, she becomes aware that there is something very strange going on in the abbey and the surrounding community. There is open conflict between the abbess, Draigen, and the local chief, Adnar. Draigen herself is both arrogant and ambitious, and seems at times to be trying to impede Fidelma’s investigation. The abbey itself seems subtly wrong to Fidelma - there are few older members, and one of them, Bronach, is treated with much disrespect, as is Bronach’s protegee, Berrach, a severely disabled sister. Two sisters are missing - overdue to return from an errand - and though the younger one’s physical description matches the body, the abbess insists it cannot be her. And there is something strange about the abbey itself - sometimes strange noises seem to issue from the earth below the abbey, which Draigen says are the result of tidal water filling caves that riddle the area.

Meanwhile, Ross has been investigating the abandoned ship, and has discovered that it was brought to shore nearby, by a party of Irish warriors of the clan Ui Fidgenti, who pit the crew to work in the local copper mines. The ship itself vanished overnight while the Ui Fidgenti celebrated.

Fidelma finds things to concern her at Asnar’s stronghold as well. Draigen’s former husband, Ferbal, a bitter misogynist, lives in the compound. Adnar has guests - Torcan, prince of Ui Fidgenti and his companions, and Olcan, son of the local overlord, both families with ambition and grudes against her brother. And everywhere, in the abbey, on the abandoned vessel, even on the books in the abbey, Fidelma finds traces of an unusual red clay, commonly found in copper mines.

Another satisfying mystery from Peter Tremayne, complex and rich in atmosphere, drawing on both Irish history and legend, and the history of the Irish and Roman churches and the conflicts between them. Fidelma must uncover the secrets of the community, and of politics and greed, to solve the mysteries, and then, perhaps most satisfying of all, she sets forth fir new adventures with Eadulf at her side.

[James Wirrell · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is another excellent mystery in the Sister Fidelma series. I would give this book 3.5 stars, but round it up to 4 stars. Like the other books in this series, there is a solid 4 stars for the well thought out plot and wonderful historical context, but only 3 stars for the rather wooden characters and brusque storytelling. So, let me cover the negative first. The characters tend to be caricatures of themselves. The wicked and twisted really are wicked and twisted. Fidelma, on the other hand, seems to be the author’s ideal superwoman, however, because the author tries to always make her appear perfect, she often comes across as an insecure, humorless know-it-all. I really like the foundation of the Fidelma character and a I think more of a human touch would make her much more relatable. The storytelling also seems a rather brusque, and I wonder if this stems from the author being a scholar who took to fiction writing. That’s what I don’t like, but there is so much to love about this book and series. The plot is very well thought out, and it rarely lags. Details are important and Tremayne drops important details throughout that are important clues. Tremayne also provides a rich and fascinating historical context to the story. All in all, I highly recommend both this book and the whole Fidelma series as well worth your time.

[Greg · Rating 5 out of 5]

The best in the Sr. Fidelma series yet!

Set again in the Ireland of the time between the fall of the Roman Empire and what came to be known as the “Middle Ages,” the land of our heroine is a wild country of multiple small kingdoms and strongmen and where the older forms of worship continue, especially in the countryside, despite the best efforts of the new religion of Christianity.

And this Christianity is not yet the more uniform version of the Roman Church, as it is also struggling with the Irish form that assigns greater participation and equality to women.

It is in this setting that Sr. Fidelma, a young but learned woman with standing in the law courts of the day, civil as well as religious, encounters murder by beheading in the midst of an abbey for women religious.

Mysteries abound, as persons of family, religion, kingdoms, and ethnicities contend with one another even as Fidelma struggles to identify both what happened and why.

I found this to be a really engrossing tale, one that both entertained with the storyline as well as painted a wonderful portrait of a time and place that, save for this kind of novel, is beyond recovery.

[Rebecca · Rating 3 out of 5]

Still early in the series, Peter Tremayne's The Subtle Serpent gives us a not-yet-fully developed Sister Fidelma, and a strange intermingling of Brother Eadulf. Something is definitely amiss at the Abbey of the Salmon of the Three Wells, one of which has recently hosted a beheaded corpse! The whodunit aspects stretch out a bit longer than necessary, and the twists and turns feel a bit more like loose threads, but it is a solid installment in the series. Most enjoyable is Sister Fidelma's facing off with the cantankerous (that's generous) Abbess Draigen. There are rather a lot of sisters to keep track of, and so empathy for some of the characters doesn't really have a chance to develop. As always, however, Tremayne weaves in medieval Irish history of both pagan and early Christian origins and it is well worth allowing yourself to be lured in to a land of yesteryear wherein the contexts may be old, but the motives are just as relevant today.

[Luka · Rating 4 out of 5]

As someone who enjoys dark, medieval settings and mysteries, I highly recommend Peter Tremayne's The Subtle Serpent. The book immerses you in the world of 7th century Ireland, a time of political and religious turmoil, and presents a gripping mystery that will keep you guessing until the very end.

Attention to historical detail is impressive, and Tremayne skillfully weaves in elements of Irish mythology and folklore to add to the book's eerie atmosphere. The characters are well-drawn and complex, with their own motivations and secrets that gradually come to light as the story unfolds.

'It is odd, is it not? When victory is absolute, it brngs a sense almost of dread. Great fortune only makes us more afraid of the reverse.'

'Who knows themselves and overcomes their problems can go on to achieve many things in life'

'Many people seek to hide the truth from one another. But the greater hatred arises when the person has hidden the truth from themselves.'

[Silvio Weitzl · Rating 5 out of 5]

Historische Krimireihe mit Suchtpotential

„Die Tote im Klosterbrunnen“ ist Schwester Fidelmas fünfter Fall (zählt man den Band „Und die Hölle folgte ihm nach“ als dritten Teil, obwohl erst später erschienen). Diesmal wird die Heldin im Jahre 666 u.Z. in ein Kloster im Süden des Königreiches Muman gerufen um die Ermordung einer Unbekannten aufzuklären. Zu Beginn zittern wir um das Leben von Eadulf, dem Partner der ersten beiden Fällen Fidelmas, und hoffen auf eine Wiedervereinigung. Während ihren Ermittlungen konfrontiert sie die Bewohner innerhalb der Mauern mit deren Schwächen und Laster. Fidelma entwirrt nach und nach ein Familiendrama und wird in politische Geschehnisse verstrickt. Klug, feministisch und lehrreich wie gewohnt, beherrscht Peter Treymane die Kunst einen dauerhaft an das Buch zu fesseln.

[Sherry · Rating 4 out of 5]

#4 -Sister Fidelma is sent to a remote abbey at the request of the Abbess for a dálaigh to solve who and why the headless body of a young woman has been stuffed down the main drinking well of the Abbey. The barc transporting her discovers a merchant ship under full sail off the Irish coast with no crew or cargo. An added mystery is Fidelma’s finding the book she had given Brother Eadulf as a parting gift in Rome, in a bag on the empty ship.
Dual mysteries, hatred and animosity, political intrigues, prejudice, greed are all piled in in multiple layers where one question answered, opens two further questions. Through this young Sister Fidelma must untangle the lies, jealousies, hatred, threats to discover the murder and the threats to her brother’s kingdom of Cashel.

[Il_mare_ghiacciato · Rating 3 out of 5]

Anni fa comprai a metà prezzo tre libri del ciclo dedicato a sorella Fidelma, monaca irlandese nata dalla fantasia di Peter Tremayne. Come succede nella maggior parte dei miei acquisti compulsivi, i romanzi sono rimasti fino ad ora a prendere polvere in libreria. Ma poi ho deciso: questo è l’anno giusto.
Quando devo decidere quale leggere, però, mi rendo subito conto che la cronologia dei romanzi di Tremayne ha qualche problema, almeno in Italia. Alcuni libri non sono stati tradotti, e la casa editrice ha quindi pubblicato in ordine diverso da quello originale. Persino nei testi stessi c’è qualche dissonanza, e si ricordano a volte due, a volte tre casi precedenti. Gli stessi lettori stranieri indicano i libri in successione varia ed eventuale. Insomma, una gran confusione. Per chi voglia star tranquillo, secondo me c’è da tener fede alla cronologia d’uscita degli originali, tenendo però presente che Absolution by Murder, il primo, edito nel 1994 in patria, non mi risulta sia uscito in Italia. Ecco allora che da noi Un sudario per il vescovo (1995) dovrebbe essere considerata la prima indagine di Fidelma, ma no, L’abbazia degli innocenti (1995), evidentemente edita precedentemente in Italia, riporta in copertina la dicitura “la prima indagine di sorella Fidelma”. Di questo passo, L’astuzia del serpente mette bene in evidenza, sulla prima pagina interna, un “Volume Due” che toglie ogni dubbio. Ma a questo punto si è consci che dovrebbe invece essere il quarto della serie (un signore inglese lo recensisce come quinto, ma credo che in questo caso si sbagli lui).
Insomma, va bene la successione cronologica, va bene essere attenti ai dettagli, ma non voglio impazzire per iniziare a leggere una saga che non so nemmeno se mi piacerà. Così, nonostante avessi sottomano L’abbazia degli innocenti, ho preferito leggere L’astuzia del serpente, la cui trama mi interessava di più.
Anteposto tutto ciò, posso dire che a lettura conclusa non è un gran problema non leggere l’opera tutta in fila. E’ vero, si fa cenno ad eventi già accaduti e che dovremmo conoscere, ma il narratore fa tutto ciò che deve per metterci al corrente dei fatti nel più breve tempo possibile, e possiamo goderci la storia volta per volta.
La storia, ecco, devo ammettere che non sia un granché di originalità. Già l’idea di un “investigatore di Dio” non è nuova (frate Guglielmo de Il nome della Rosa, padre Brown, fratello Cadfael, e via dicendo), ma l’intreccio narrativo è davvero poca cosa, e quando diviene più sostanzioso si fa fatica a seguirlo, tanto che nelle ultime pagine si perde un po’ il filo di tutte le varie faccende. Ma a questo c’è rimedio. Come nei migliori thriller classici, l’ultimo capitolo è dedicato alla spiegazione del caso, fatta in modo sempre poco umile dall’investigatore (qui Fidelma, ma leggi anche Maigret, Poirot, Sherlock, miss Marple…) con tutti i protagonisti davanti ad aspettare che qualcuno arresti il colpevole celato fra loro.
Altro impedimento, ve lo dico, saranno i nomi dei protagonisti, tutti rigorosamente in gaelico… Non provateci nemmeno a tentare di ricordarli, che tanto c’è il solito aiutino ad inizio del libro, con la lista che andrete a ricontrollare ogni tre per due.
Buona lettura.

[Lori · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was unaware this was a series, so I read Sister Fidelma #4 without reading #1-3. Historical mystery set in early Ireland. The main character is a sister of the new Christian faith who is also a designated investigator and presenter of evidence she unearths at court. The book was steeped in ancient Irish clan history and steeped in the traditions of the pagans now being challenged by the new Faith. The mystery was intriguing (if gruesome) and it was interesting to see a puzzle solved using logic and observation. At times it was hard to follow the intricate laws and clan histories. The Latin quotes were fun.