Bookshelf

The Captive Bride

The day she was wedded to the bold English knight Aidan de Brice young Gwynne was taken captive by the Welsh bandits who'd claimed her since birth. Years have passed, and she barely recognizes the breathtaking warrior before her - but her senses recall what her memory cannot. Still, any lingering thoughts of love must be dispelled, for the proud, brave lady's loyalties now lie elsewhere.

Aidan is shocked to discover that the infamous "Dark Legend" - the elusive rebel leader he is honor bound to defeat - is not only a beautiful woman…but also his stolen bride! Now that he has taken her prisoner, Aidan knows his true duty is to his heart. Defying his king, Aidan must use all his power to keep fair Gwynne from harm…and rekindle her lost memories of a soul-stirring love more mighty than any kingdom or crown.

THE MAIDEN WARRIOR
Avon Books
ISBN: 038081787X
June 2002

• This was the first book of mine to be picked up for production in hardcover by Rhapsody Book Club – and though it hasn’t always been a favorite with reviewers, primarily due to the presence of an actual sword-wielding warrior woman as its heroine, it remains popular with readers and is my bestselling book to date.

This book sprang from some of the work I do in my other career as an English teacher. My sophomore Honors class reads and studies the King Arthur Tales each spring, and that happened to be right around the time in 2000 that I was beginning to plot what would turn out to be THE MAIDEN WARRIOR.

I was reviewing some of the actual historical aspects of the Arthurian Legends for discussion with my class, when something caught my eye and got the old creative juices going. It was a comment to the effect that King Henry, who was near death when King Arthur’s bones were supposedly discovered at Glastonbury Abbey, had been having a difficult time with the Welsh in their constant uprisings to declare independence from the Crown’s rule.

The Welsh apparently believed that King Arthur, who was rumored not to have died but to have rather vanished into Avalon, was preparing to show himself again as the warrior of legend, to lead the people to freedom from the English. The writer went on to insinuate that the convenient “discovery” of Arthur’s bones at around that time was in fact a ruse, engineered by the English king and the monks at Glastonbury to quell the uprisings; the fact of actual remains would prove once and for all that Arthur was a mortal man, like any other – and that most importantly, he was dead and would not return to lead any rebellion.

And so I started playing the “What If?” game with myself. “What if the legend was altered a bit so that King Arthur need not return in his adult form, but rather be reborn entirely? And what if there were signs and prophecies that seemed to be fulfilled in that context, culminating in the birth of a infant that the Welsh believed was the spirit of King Arthur, ready to grow and learn and become the unmatchable warrior of destiny, ready to lead them to freedom? And most importantly, what if that infant was a girl?”

That is how Gwynne ap Moran’s story began – embellished with the elements and conflicts that take it from the realm of straight historical fiction and into the genre of historical romance.

The working title of THE MAIDEN WARRIOR was DARK LEGEND, which was nixed by Avon as being too fantasy/sci-fi in tone. That decision turned out to be a good thing in the long run, as Christine Feehan’s Carpathian installment, DARK LEGEND, appeared on bookstore shelves a mere six months before THE MAIDEN WARRIOR went on sale to the public. THE MAIDEN WARRIOR was my second choice title, and I think it captures the story concept just as well.