I picked up a copy, at a library book sale, of one of Susanna Gregory's Chronicles of Matthew Bartholomew.  It is the 5th in the series and I have never read any in this series previously.  Is this a series that I should read in order?  Or are they more like Ellis Peters' Brother Cadfael where the order is not particularly important? Thanks to any one that can help with this question.

I have no idea, but they do sound good!  You might ask over in the Historical Fiction forum to see if anyone there has read them and can give you some info

Thanks.  I'll try that!

I think you'll find that around here (Mystery/Thriller forum), people tend to be pretty...um...anal about reading series' in order. Of course, not everyone is this way but a lot of us are.  With most series books, the author spends time developing the characters so you do miss things if you read them out of order.

Having said that, I have the first three Matthew Bartholomew books sitting here but I haven't read any of them yet.  I've heard good things about them!

I would read these in order, but that is just my rather fanatical preference. That said, this is one series where each book does stand on its own fairly well.

Cheryl