<b>Step back to an English village in 1255, where life plays out in dramatic vignettes illuminating twenty-two unforgettable characters.</b><br><br>Maidens, monks, and millers&#8217; sons &#8212; in these pages, readers will meet them all. There&#8217;s Hugo, the lord&#8217;s nephew, forced to prove his manhood by hunting a wild boar; sharp-tongued Nelly, who supports her family by selling live eels; and the peasant&#8217;s daughter, Mogg, who gets a clever lesson in how to save a cow from a greedy landlord. There&#8217;s also mud-slinging Barbary (and her noble victim); Jack, the compassionate half-wit; Alice, the singing shepherdess; and many more. With a deep appreciation for the period and a grand affection for both characters and audience, Laura Amy Schlitz creates twenty-two riveting portraits and linguistic gems equally suited to silent reading or performance. Illustrated with pen-and-ink drawings by Robert Byrd &#8212; inspired by the Munich-Nuremberg manuscript, an illuminated poem from thirteenth-century Germany &#8212; this witty, historically accurate, and utterly human collection forms an exquisite bridge to the people and places of medieval England.