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Searching... Stayton Public Library | TEEN COATS | Searching... Unknown |
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Summary
Summary
Cecily's father has ruined her life. He's moving them to occupied Wales, where the
king needs good strong Englishmen to keep down the vicious Welshmen. At least
Cecily will finally be the lady of the house.
Gwenhwyfar knows all about that house. Once she dreamed of being the lady there
herself, until the English destroyed the lives of everyone she knows. Now she must
wait hand and foot on this bratty English girl.
While Cecily struggles to find her place amongst the snobby English landowners,
Gwenhwyfar struggles just to survive. And outside the city walls, tensions are rising
ever higher--until finally they must reach the breaking point.
Author Notes
J. Anderson Coats has masters degrees in history and library science. She lives with her family in Washington State. Visit her website at www.jandersoncoats.com .
Reviews (5)
School Library Journal Review
Gr 6-9-Set in 13th-century North Wales 10 years after the English takeover, this is an instantly gripping story of injustice spawned by subjugation. Cecily, an English girl, tells readers from the outset that her life has been ruined now that she has been uprooted to live among "savages," as she calls the Welsh. Gwenhwyfar is a servant to Cecily, who assumes that she is to be the lady of the house and demands to be treated accordingly. Gwinny resents Cecily, referring to her throughout her narrative as "the Brat." Fleshed-out, multidimensional characters breathe life into this little-known period. Coats's cinematic prose immerses readers in medieval life as she vividly depicts the animosity between the Welsh and the English. Though both young teens are strong and opinionated, they feel victimized, and their determination and will to survive are clearly voiced. While Cecily is cruel to Gwinny at times, she also expresses occasional compassion for her and intercedes anonymously to help her and her family. Even in her haughtiness, Cecily disdains her father's fawning to impress those in power and is disapproving when he reduces promised wages to Welshmen by half. Gwinny also shows some compassion for Cecily when she saves her from a potentially bad match with a scoundrel. This debut novel reverberates with detail, drama, and compassion. The appended historical note is helpful; it's unfortunate that there is no glossary of unusual terms. Fans of Karen Cushman's The Midwife's Apprentice (1995) and Catherine, Called Birdy (1994, both Clarion) will surely be drawn to this unique story.-Renee Steinberg, formerly at Fieldstone Middle School, Montvale, NJ (c) Copyright 2012. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Publisher's Weekly Review
Cecily is furious when her father uproots her to begin a new life in Caernarvon (occupied Wales), where he will be a burgess, keeping order on behalf of the English king. The year is 1293, and tensions between the English and the Welsh are high. When Cecily arrives in Caernarvon, she behaves haughtily, attempting to act as the lady of the house in place of her late mother. Welsh housemaid "Gwinny" hates her immediately, and the girls' battles and mutual resentment mirror the larger problems between their respective countries. Coats's debut shifts gracefully between the two girls' perspectives, finding empathy for both-no small feat when it comes to Cecily, who is naive and sometimes downright cruel. She begins to recognize the injustices around her (including several of her own doing), while Gwinny struggles to keep her gravely ill mother and younger brother alive. Addressing the difference between vengeance and justice, the novel is steeped in the details and dialect of the Middle Ages, depicting barbaric events and dramatic inequalities. Ages 12-up. Agent: Ammi-Joan Paquette, Erin Murphy Literary Agency. (Apr.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Horn Book Review
In 1290s Caernarvon, Wales, English burgesses tax and oppress the local Welsh, who have only recently come under English rule. Into this castle-dominated town arrives English Cecily, resentful of her father's new post as a town burgess and landholder. All Cecily can think of is how it's all beneath her -- the place, her father's townhouse, and the filthy, taciturn Welsh servants. Arrogant, spoiled, and ignorant, Cecily plays the chatelaine by bullying her servant Gwenhwyfar -- known to Cecily as Gwinny -- and betraying the impoverished Welsh to their greedy overseers, even as she struggles to fit in with the town's snooty English coterie, the honesti. At the same time, Gwinny the servant barely survives, tending to her half-dead mother in a hovel with her meager earnings. Then the Welsh rebel against the English: now Cecily is abject and terrified, and it's Gwinny's turn to exercise power. Terse, cantankerous, and vivid, Cecily's first-person voice brings this tense situation to life, as does Gwinny's alternate voice -- haggard, starved, and angry. Coats allows the two protagonists to be both sympathetic and unsympathetic in this unusually honest portrait of the effects of power. Refreshingly, she asks her readers to see beyond the perspectives of each narrator to interpret between the lines; at the same time, she offers us a potent historical novel. deirdre f. baker (c) Copyright 2012. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
Two girls of very different degree are brought together unwillingly by the English conquest of Wales. Cecily is in a pet at having to leave the home of her youth--where her mother is buried--and relocate to the Welsh frontier, but her father is a younger son. He will take a burgage in Caernarvon, recently conquered by Edward I. In exchange for a home, he will help to keep the King's peace. Cecily hates Caernarvon. She hates its weather, its primitive appointments and its natives, especially Gwinny, the servant girl who doesn't obey, and the young man who stares at her. It would be easy to dismiss this book as a Karen Cushman knockoff; Cecily's voice certainly has a pertness that recalls Catherine, Called Birdy. But there's more of an edge, conveyed both in the appalling ease with which Cecily dismisses the Welsh as subhuman and in Gwinny's fierce parallel narrative. "I could kill the brat a hundred different ways." Never opting for the easy characterization, debut author Coats compellingly re-creates this occupation from both sides. It all leads to an ending so brutal and unexpected it will take readers' breath away even as it makes them think hard about the title. Brilliant: a vision of history before the victors wrote it. (historical note) (Historical fiction. 12 up)]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
In 1293, Cecily and her father leave Coventry, England, to settle in Caernarvon, Wales, where the king offers opportunities to those who will settle in the newly conquered land. Lonely, miserable, and willful, Cecily tries to assert her authority as the lady of the house, only to be thwarted by the housekeeper and Gwenhwyfar, a servant girl her own age. Over the next year, Cecily begins to understand more about the town and the grievances of the Welsh starving outside its walls, but nothing prepares her for the savage sack of Caernarvon. In this intriguing first novel, the main narrative is Cecily's, but passages written from Gwenhwyfar's point of view provide a startling contrast and foreshadow the story's climax. Cecily is a flawed protagonist who grows throughout the story, yet stoical Gwenhwyfar is the more sympathetic character. Their shifting relationship strengthens the story, while Coats' considerable research provides details of everyday life that ground this dark and sometimes brutal historical novel.--Phelan, Carolyn Copyright 2010 Booklist