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The Rope Dancer
The Rope Dancer
Author: Roberta Gellis
Carys -- crowds gathered to watch her perform, this lithe amber-eyed rope dancer ... Telor -- the wandering minstrel whose love for Carys made his songs more sweet, more passionate ... Together they discover the tender joys of innocence and sweet agonies of new-found love in a magical era ...
ISBN-13: 9780515089776
ISBN-10: 051508977X
Publication Date: 5/1/1987
Pages: 426
Rating:
  • Currently 3.5/5 Stars.
 7

3.5 stars, based on 7 ratings
Publisher: Jove
Book Type: Paperback
Other Versions: Hardcover
Members Wishing: 0
Reviews: Member | Amazon | Write a Review

Top Member Book Reviews

reviewed The Rope Dancer on + 53 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 2
Another keeper from Roberta Gellis. This one deals with the lives of the traveling entertainers in the middle ages. There is no sugar coating about the times, the style of living, the dirt and the confusion of the being caught between warring noblemen.
CAJUN avatar reviewed The Rope Dancer on + 339 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 1
i enjoyed this book, any thing that roberta gellis writes is a winner
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reviewed The Rope Dancer on + 1217 more book reviews
The time is the twelfth century in England. Carys is a rope dancer who had once been part of a successful troupe of traveling players. While they were welcomed because of the entertainment they provided, they are also outcasts because they do not have a master.

When the story opens the troupe has been disbanded. Carys' latest protector has just been killed. Carys herself is threatened with rape and murder by the men at arms of the lord in whose hall she was dancing and she is forced to use all of her wits to escape.

Alone and destitute, she is found by two men traveling together-- Telor, a minstrel, and Deri, a dwarf. As a minstrel who entertains in lordly halls, Tedor, the son of a respectable burgher, is of higher social status than Carys or Deri although Deri was once a respectable settled man himself before misfortune reft him of wife and home. Tedor is on his way to visit his old teacher, the Welsh bard Eunion.

But events of this turbulent time have overtaken the manor where Eunion was living under the protection of an amiable lord, and Telor, Carys and Deri become involved in a lively adventure where their lives are at stake.

Gellis does her usual excellent job of drawing the reader into her medieval world. The afterword is definitely worth reading because she lays out there some of her philosophy about writing historical novels. This book is one of her best.


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