Two healers, one in the 21st century the other in the thirteenth, are unjustly harrassed. The Valley of Ravens by Barbara Erskine is the third book by this author that I’ve read. All are timeslip novels, all a completely different blending of contemporary and history. Erskine is quickly becoming addictive. The two women, who live in the same house centuries apart, are victims of persecution. Eve, desperate to escape from a stalker in Suffolk, a retired GP who doesn’t believe in natural healing, has moved secretly to a lonely Welsh valley. How does her stalker find out her address in the Valley of the Ravens? Little does Eve know that her rundown cottage, T ŷ’r Wrach, is known locally as the Witch’s House and carries an ancient curse. As she gets to know her neighbours and begins the renovations, strange things begin to happen. Small gifts. Noises in the night. Is it her stalker, or does the house have a ghost? And why are local men reluctant to visit the cottage?
Alys, who lived in the house in 1260, attends the wounded in the aftermath of a battle where she treats the last Prince of Wales, Llewellyn. A lasting friendship grows and, when he is near the Valley of the Ravens, Llewellyn visits Brother Afan, a holy man living in a nearby cave, and Alys at T ŷ’r Wrach where he eats her bread and honey. When he is killed, Alys is wrongly blamed by her neighbours for betraying Llewellyn, Prince of Gwynedd, Lord of Snowdon and of Aberffraw, to the English king Edward I. It is rumoured the prince paid her for witchcraft. Llewellyn’s death is grisly and Alys has a critical role to play in what happens next. As the story of each woman unfolds, trying to understand their persecutors and struggling to survive, it becomes clearer why Alys is still present at Eve’s house. She made a vow to the prince which she attempted to fulfill.
The Valley of Ravens is a masterful blending of ancient and modern, romance, superstition, witchcraft and Welsh history. Atmospheric, spooky, rooted in Welsh nature and tradition.
This is a long book but I didn’t want to put it down. Prince Llewellyn’s story is true, but Eve, Alys, T ŷ’r Wrach and the Valley of the Ravens are fictional.

Read my reviews of other novels by Barbara Erskine:-
THE DREAM WEAVERS
THE STORY SPINNER

If you like this, try:-
‘The Royal Rebel’ by Elizabeth Chadwick #1JEANETTEOFKENT
‘Days Without End’ by Sebastian Barry #1DAYSWITHOUTEND
‘Disobedient’ by Elizabeth Fremantle

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE VALLEY OF RAVENS by Barbara Erskine @Barbaraerskine https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-a4v via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:-