Ellis Peters' Shropshire

by Ellis Peters

Paper Book, 1999

Status

Available

Call number

914.24504859

Genres

Nonfiction

Collections

Read, High rated read

Publication

Stroud : Alan Sutton, 1999.

Description

Shropshire is Ellis Peters' county, the world of her medieval mysteries. In this book she takes the reader into the heart of the county, describing the Roman Road and revealing her connections with the town of Shrewsbury and the setting of the Benedictine Abbey featured in the Cadfael novels. She traces the history of the country through its border castles, Georgian country houses and old Elizabethan town houses, old monasteries and the modern office blocks of the town. In doing so, she recounts her personal connection with the county of her birth, from her childhood spent near Coalbrookdale to her later years in Madeley, Telford.

User reviews

LibraryThing member MrsLee

This is the story of Shropshire. The author covers history, peoples and buildings in her own loving way. Ellis Peters is a master of painting a landscape with words. The photographs are lovely, I only wish more of them pertained to what the author was describing. There were many photos, but somehow

they were not usually of the parts I found most intriguing in her narrative. My favorite part of this book was at the end where the author spoke of the bits of Shropshire that showed through in her various stories.

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LibraryThing member jjmcgaffey

Very interesting. It's a cross between a biography (though she explicitly refuses to make it that) and a...travel book? A description of Shropshire - of the land and geography, of the history, of the ruins and near-ruins that dot the shire, of the great houses that remain livable (though few are

still homes for a single family), of newer developments (in her own lifetime) that have altered the appearance and the economics of the shire...She paints lovely word-pictures of all of these, and I was trying throughout to remember what I'd seen of them when I visited the area. It really makes me want to go back, book in hand, and check all this stuff out (and what's changed, in the intervening decade-plus). She discusses throughout how Shropshire has imprinted her, and affects her writing. The last chapter talks about what parts of what she's been describing show up in what of her books. I've read most of what she's published as Ellis Peters, and now I want to reread a few of them; I've read very little of what she's published as Edith Pargeter, and now I want to read some (all) of them. If you enjoy any of her work, this is a great expansion of view on her; if you've never read any of her work, this book will probably make you want to. Loved it.

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