Title: White Rose of Avalon
Author: Kelley Heckart
Author Links: Website | Facebook | Amazon | Goodreads
Release Date: February 13, 2020
Publisher: Kelley Heckart
Genre: Historical, Fantasy, Romance
ARC Provided From: Kelley Heckart
A new twist on a timeless tale. Do you like captivating, passionate historical fantasy featuring King Arthur, Gwenhwyfar, Merlin, Nimue, Morgaine, and Lancelot?
Inspired by The Mists of Avalon, this sensual retelling of the Arthurian romances brings these legendary characters to life.
Destiny cannot be altered.
With Britannia falling to the Saxon hordes, Morgaine, Queen of the Faeries, has no choice but to make a pact with the Christian monks. She promises to give them a High King who will unite the Britons against the Saxons if he takes a queen from the faery realm. Morgaine hopes this will restore the Goddess faith and return Avalon to its rightful place. She sends Lancelot to guard the future High King, but when a love potion falls into the wrong hands, all seems lost.
Gwenhwyfar is the only hope for the future, but betrayal, revenge, and forbidden love surround her, all of which could send both Britannia and Avalon into ruins.
Morgaine meant well. As a queen, she sacrificed much and demanded much to keep her kingdom flourishing and reverence on the Goddess. She was the kind of queen many would have thrived under. Except her good intentions blinded her to the fact that the world was going to change whether she decreed it or not. Her meddling to ensure the future she wanted happened set into motion events that would forever change the world she knew and desperately clung to.
The fight to save what she thought was a dying kingdom became a fight to save the one she truly loved. To do so, she needed to lose almost everything, let go of preconceived notions of what the future was supposed to be, and embrace the fact that change was inevitable. But that didn't mean they would be forgotten.
I'm not big on Arthurian legend and I had high hopes this story would engage me in ways others hadn't. It didn't disappoint. Except for Nimue, the cast of characters and some of what I read was familiar. I especially liked that Ms. Heckart delved into Lancelot and Gwenhwyfar's relationship, something often touched on in other stories I've read but not nearly as in-depth as done here.
What was unfamiliar in this story was what drew me in. Lives woven together for the betterment of a kingdom; destinies deterred by mistakes; relationships shattered by betrayal. The hope that had shone so brightly at the beginning dimmed as the story progressed, and I wondered if it was possible to find it again.
Ms. Heckart is a new to me author and I'm glad to have met her through this story. She knows her folklore and characters that many have probably forgotten. The story isn't overrun with sex or battle scenes. This story balances both without losing sight of the plot. The characters develop through the course of the story--growing, learning, living, dying--and their emotions mirror those stages of their lives. If White Rose is an accurate example of Ms. Heckart's writing voice and style, I'm inclined to see what else she's written and to believe that others will enjoy this story as much as I did.
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