A Crown of Lights (Merrily Watkins Mysteries) - Softcover

Rickman, Phil

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0330484508 ISBN 13: 9780330484503

Publisher: Macmillan UK, 2001

Synopsis

When a derelict country church is bought by a pagan couple, the local evangelical minister reacts with fury. A modern witch hunt begins, and Merrily Watkins is expected to keep a lid on the cauldron. Meanwhile, there is the problem of the man who won’t be parted from his dead wife, the ancient mystery of the five local churches dedicated to St. Michael, and a killer with an old tradition to guard.

About this title

From the Publisher

Over the years, Phil Rickman has won high acclaim for his chilling supernatural tales, including Celtic thrillers as well as the Reverend Merrily Watkins Mysteries, featuring Britain’s first female exorcist. Meticulously researched, rich in historic detail, these atmospheric procedurals are all cracking–good reads.

From the Author

The Merrily Watkins series is a set of novels about the people whose job is to investigate the paranormal and attempt to deal with any antisocial elements it appears to throw up.

Here in Britain, there's a very long-established tradition of exorcism, but it's been changing recently. Exorcists -and there's one in every diocese- are now known as Deliverance ministers or consultants. Their job is to advise the regular clergy on all aspects of possible psychic disturbance: ghostly and poltergeist phenomena, negative spiritual practices and, very occasionally, possession.

It's a risky and controversial occupation- especially for a woman.

Merrily Watkins is a widow in her mid-to-late thirties, she's deeply insecure, often paranoid about some of the things she's called on to do, would hate ever to be thought pious and.. oh yes, she has a volatile teenage daughter, Jane, who is more interested in paganism.

Merrily is vicar of a rural parish in Herefordshire, on the Welsh Border, and her Deliverance work is run from an office near Hereford Cathedral.

In her job -as with a number of the exorcists I've talked to in the course of continuing research- Merrily is frequently involved in police investigations. So this series is, essentially, crime. Most of the crime is very dark, sometimes a little nightmarish.

Not horror, though, and definitely not fantasy- even if the element of mystery sometimes exists on, shall we say, more than one level..?

About this edition

• Publisher: Macmillan UK
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 0330484508
• ISBN 13: 9780330484503
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 576