Musings of a Medieval Abbess

Musings of a Medieval Abbess is set in the borderlands between Scotland and England in the mid-1400s at the very beginning of the tumultuous period known as the War of the Roses. Written as the journal of a middle-aged Augustinian nun, Isentrude Clifford, it documents the final three years of her tenure as the abbess of an Augustinian convent. The Augustinian Order is a teaching and healing order, active in service to the surrounding community and renowned for its scholars, men and women who translate and copy the writings of the ancients. Sister Isentrude and her friend, Sister Eawynn, are nuns by circumstance, not by choice. Isentrude Clifford was given to the Church by her mother due to a deformity. Eawynn Ogle joined to order to escape a marriage alliance.Their relationship becomes the enduring love story of two women who grew to love to each other more than life.

Isentrude's journal recounts and reflects upon the daily challenges and events in a world that is ruled jointly by the Catholic Church and absolute monarchies, a world in which women have little power. Isentrude questions the stories and parables of the Bible as well as the grandiose splendor of the Church and its hierarchy of bishops and archbishops who do little to serve their communities. When tragedy strikes, their world is turned upset down.