Mel's Shelves: Valentine's Day Book Blitz, Day 10: The Lady and the Minstrel by Joyce DiPastena

Tuesday, February 10, 2015

Valentine's Day Book Blitz, Day 10: The Lady and the Minstrel by Joyce DiPastena

Day 10

14 Days of Romance Valentine's Day Book Blitz Event

We are going back in time today with an amazing medieval romance by Joyce DiPastena today.

In 13th century England, Robert Marcel chafes against the law that holds him bound as a villein on his lord’s manor. He tries to make a daring escape and is nearly caught by his cruel master, but a young girl helps him slip away.

Years pass and Robert takes up trade as a minstrel. Invited to play at a banquet for the notorious Earl of Saxton, he is stunned to come face to face with the girl he’s never forgotten—now Lady Marguerite of Winbourne, betrothed to the earl. Her status as a noblewoman puts her completely out of Robert’s reach, but he knows they are meant to be together. He vows to make her his wife no matter what the cost.

Lady Marguerite has often thought of the young man she helped escape. Her tender feelings for him quickly turn into much more when they are brought back into each other’s lives. She longs to be free to marry Robert, the man she loves, but that will require her to sacrifice all she holds dear.

They are tested at every turn by those bent on driving them apart and destroying what they have found together. Can their love truly conquer all?

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Joyce DiPastena's Top 10 Favorite Fiction Books (in no particular order):

1. Friday’s Child, by Georgette Heyer
2. These Old Shades, by Georgette Heyer
3. The Three Musketeers, by Alexandre Dumas
4. Twenty Years After, by Alexandre Dumas
5. Walk With Peril, by Dorothy V.S. Jackson
6. Catherine Called Birdy, by Karen Cushman
7. Charmed Life, by Diana Wynne Jones
8. Wuthering Heights, by Emily Bronte
9. The Crystal Cave, by Mary Stewart
10. Johnny Tremain, by Esther Forbes (except I overdosed on reading this too many times in a row in high school and haven’t been able to read it again – but it’s still a favorite!)

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Joyce DiPastena dreamed of green medieval forests while growing up in the dusty copper mining town of Kearny, Arizona. She filled her medieval hunger by reading the books of Thomas B. Costain (where she fell in love with King Henry II of England), and later by attending the University of Arizona where she graduated with a degree in history, specializing in the Middle Ages. The university was also where she completed her first full-length novel...set, of course, in medieval England. Later, her fascination with Henry II led her to expand her research horizons to the far reaches of his “Angevin Empire” in France, which became the setting of her first published novel, Loyalty’s Web (a 2007 Whitney Award Finalist).

When she’s not writing, Joyce loves to read, play the piano, and spend time with her sister and friends. A highlight of her year is attending the annual Arizona Renaissance Festival. She lives with her two cats, Clio and Glinka Rimsky-Korsokov, in Mesa, Arizona.

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Visit the other blogs participating in this Blitz:

http://www.annadelc.com/blog

http://chapsandbustles.blogspot.com/

http://lisaisabookworm.blogspot.com

http://www.katiescleanbookcollection.blogspot.com

http://booksshelly27.blogspot.com/

Bookbeauty411.blogspot.com

http://beautifulblessings86.wordpress.com/

http://fictionalrendezvousbookblog.blogspot.com/

julkbearreads.wordpress.com

mybookshelfbookreviews.blogspot.com