In the last book of this trilogy (A Discovery of Witches), Diana Bishop had discovered that her witches’ powers had been locked up by her parents to keep her safe. Now that she’s married her one true vampire love (Matthew Clairmont), and all the other creatures of the world are after them for going against the rules that forbid that, it’s obvious that she needs a teacher. Fortunately, she inherited her father’s ability to travel in time, so it’s off to Elizabethan England they go. Matthew, naturally, had a life there, as Matthew Roydon, spy for the queen, and patron of a brotherhood called the School of Night, which included such men as Walter Raleigh and Christopher Marlowe.
And so, Dianna is thrown into life as the wife of a fairly prominent man in the 16th century. What I enjoyed about this book is her (and let’s face it, the author’s, since she’s a historian) clear joy in seeing all these things she had only read about for herself. There is a certain amount of danger – Diana is well aware she sticks out like a sore thumb in a time when women should not necessarily do that, and the creatures of this time still do not approve of the union of a witch and a vampire.
The other thing I like about this story is the family aspect. The de Clermonts take family very seriously, and since they’re vampires, the foundation is a created family, so they are open to looking at anyone, even in a witch. Matthew and Diana do go back to France when they’re summoned by Matthew’s father, Phillipe, who in the present day, is dead. It was nice to be able to meet him, because he had loomed large over the last book, even by the force of his past presence.
Matthew and Diana are back in the present day at the end of the book, and I’m very interested to see how this all ends.
I also read this week that this is being turned into a tv series. I’ll be very interested to see how that turns out.
The North Wind and the Sea 