This book,..this book helped shape me into the person I am today..

Now, I know,...in the grand scheme of things,..thats a pretty ridiculous statement to make..but at the time of reading ( about 15 years old) thats what life was.

This book is one of the finest stories told, and the unfolding of the characters is beautiful. I've yet to read a book that pulls me into its world so tightly.

This was probably the first "fantasy" book I read, and since I've stayed true to the genre. I love recommending this book to late teens, hoping they too will catch the fantasy fever from it. ( )

Fantastico! L'avevo già letto, ma le sensazioni a distanza di anni sono state diversissime, se pur altrettanto coinvolgenti. Peccato aver capito dopo che cronologicamente è l'ultimo della serie, nonostante la pubblicazione sia in ordine inverso... ora proverò con gli altri, ma ho qualche dubbio che siano a questo livello!

YA, female heroines can’t do wrong. Men are bad, love the the goddess, etc ( )

An engaging retelling of the Arthurian legend that gives women at least an equal role in events, rather than the secondary place they usually occupy. Well done. ( )

Got bored halfway through...

Very disappointed in this 'feminist' retelling which wasn't that at all. Lots of female characters but they are mostly wimpy Barbie clones, which we're told interminably are 'beautiful' and the Morgaine character seems to basically hate and beat herself up all the time. The story drags a lot because it isn't really a story but more of a diatribe about Christianity where all the Christians are irredeemably awful. And nearly all the men, even those that start out 'nice', are basically betrayers bla bla. It's very downbeat and as such, far too long. There's also lots about spinning. Great plans are made but then go down the tubes because the people who are meant to be directing them can't be bothered. No, this is not the feminist version I'd hoped it would be. ( )

I got a used copy for very cheap several years ago. It sat on my shelf for over a decade as a "some day I'll get to it" kind of book. I never got to it. Then I heard about how absolutely horrifying the author was, and committed to getting rid of the book in my most recent book purge. It's one thing for an author to express close-minded or idiotic values or ideals (JK Rowling, HP Lovecraft, Orson Scott Card, etc.). What this author and her spouse took part in is absolutely wretched. I don't want that name on my shelf in my home. ( )

Edit: As you can see what follows is inaccurate; my library DID have “The Mists”. It was only missing in the app—I found it on the in-library computers, and of course, on the shelves. What follows are my impressions about Marion from guessing, which I think are ‘interesting’ if rather unnecessary.

My library doesn’t carry “The Mists of Avalon”—I’ve even switched back to cow milk because it’s cheaper, so I have to be a little judicious about book buying too—but it does carry this book, a sort of women of Greek myth thing (a novel, not a $40 nonfiction investigation that Nobody in library land would have, unless you’re in debt to the slave dr—ah, the academicians), unlike Homer, who was very much a man among men, you know. I would also encourage you to buy Marion’s books if that’s your custom—$13 or so isn’t so bad for me either, someday—since the money also goes straight to children’s charities, although I won’t tell you why. In the Civil War General Grant got criticized by journalists—those eternal bearers of good news—for being an alcoholic, but Lincoln quipped that he wanted all of his generals to drink whatever Grant drank. Now, we don’t necessarily want all moms to become alcoholic ~or whatever~…. Actually, yes, we want all moms to be codependent…. But, I don’t know, I’m not very judgmental, especially about people like that. I guess my bias is that if you create media that’s beautiful…. I don’t know; I just feel like a real problem would come out in the art, you know. Now, I know that sometimes writers murder people and the critics want to let them out of jail, but I feel like those are cases where the art is fake; it’s like celebrating chaos or whatever, and disorderliness for its own sake, or mental illness for its own sake. Like if Antonin Artaud killed somebody, it would be like: yeah, no wonder. Only the excessively crazy, I don’t know, word-processor human would be like: Oh no, he was unusual; he can be ill if he wants…. But like when that one-trick pony daughter came out against Woody Allen, (Hi, my name is Abused-By-Woody-Allen), I just couldn’t believe it, because, I don’t know, I don’t feel like somebody light like that would be that shade of midnight-oppression she was painting him as. (shrugs) I guess that’s naive, right. All our mothers and teachers are bad; it says so in the books! In the newspapers!

Edit: “The Mists” itself is a very good book, but I do not think I’ll actually write about it at this time. “…. and what we cannot talk about we must pass over in silence.” ~the philosopher. —Yes, sacred things that we do not understand we must be silent about…. Perhaps when I understand. Perhaps when I experience.

Further Edit: Although I will say this: Marion says that she’s read “The Spiral Dance”, and she does seem to have a rather clever way of seeing both religions, but she’s not at all like the negative way I experienced that book, although part of that was me not being empathic with intense people, although partially I guess it was attracting someone more difficult to emphasize with. Marion is different. It’s not all about, “The terrible things you have done to me” on and on, although it’s not about denial either. The Romans, so to speak, ~can indeed~ be difficult to deal with: everything is men and machines, and they expect their women to be like that too, because there can’t be a different option for anybody, as a matter of principle…. Although it is true that sometimes they break their stupid little rules, you know. Nobody ever really “perfectly” bad, and people in general, the “average man” isn’t even really consistently bad; she just is what she is, you know.

Hopefully the last comment, since I really don’t understand: One other thing is that, even though women have their own ways in “The Mists” and it’s a women’s book, it’s also very un-Colette-y, in that the masculine and feminine overlap, and are not radically and improbably and stupidly separated, the way they sometimes are people’s minds, you know.

…. “All Gods are one God, and all Goddesses are one Goddess, and there is one Initiator. And to every man his own God, and his own truth.”

“Did you think that all our sorcery could bring about anything but God’s will, my child?”

…. The witches aspire to love everything underneath the sky, and upon the earth, but also are people with preferences, sometimes strongly held.

And it’s also a book about the non-witchy women, the gossips and normies, since even in the “witch days” or whatever—I mean, it’s never so simple as that, is it? Some people collect the sex news…. And other people get afraid, you know: that’s their thing, is that the sky is too big….

…. When I was small and my father was training me in the ways of the Good Boy Tribe, he said that the Arthurian heroes were, whatever he said, good, mysterious: but flawed because of their seeking “revenge”, you know—very polite, very vague. Of course, he never said what made them want revenge: it’s about sexual disorder, and chaos, you know. I don’t know how you’d tell it to a middle childhood person in the non-dysfunctional world: ‘In the Arthurian times, a lot of the fighting happened because the mommies and daddies….’—I don’t know. But they feel very correct not trying, finding the exact center of the comfort zone and piously staying there, you know. When you’re eight they lie to you about King Arthur, and then when you’re thirty they don’t even bother so far as that—they just chat one-sidedly about the prize of pretzels, you know. I’m sure it’s very common. “In Russia there are thousands of Levins.”

….. I, Gwenhwyfar, say that there is not one law for parents and dependent children, and another for kings and men: God has decreed that only the Highest Patriarch—and not even I!—is a man, and all men are children and slaves of the Power Father, and all must obey, all must obey always, and speak the words of obedience and never dance—this is the only morality, the only necessity…. And though in secret I desire transgression, before you all I loudly proclaim and shout that all will shout the words of obedience even as I do, and so am I righteous; I know no sin, though I am no man, but always am I a good slave, and no one may gainsay that.

…. Arthur is friendship and honor; Lancelet is sex/power.

…. So Mordred (Gwydion) was beaten as a child…. Not that Morgause was a terrible meanie; she was probably, although shrewd, mostly just an ordinary (though affluent) woman—wife/mother—of the first millennium, half-pagan, but not initiate, if not church mouse…. She’s a character it would be easy to overlook in this sort of story, but she has her place in the world.

…. Children because of Arthur, there was no war, but only scandal, in the land. 😎

…. I feel like I’ve already implied this, but (as much as I love Marion and her calm, tolerant men and passionate, aggressive women), I’m glad that Wicca today doesn’t have to be as tribal as the Craft was in the past. I can be very over-loyal, so at the beginning I didn’t understand the whole thing with say (snobbish, prescriptive) Raymond Buckland, for example, (not that you couldn’t read his books and learn), and the majority of witches today talking about the way things are now, you know. I feel like I get it now. The world is habitually negative so I guess it’s almost a tie, but today people are more willing to accept brands, and choices, rather than tribes, and shame/constraint, and I for one feel no shame in aiming to give them a brand rather than a prescriptive, tradition-of-glass, you know. “Oh, don’t offend our god; he gets very sensitive…. Obey him, therefore….” I’ll pass.

…. I was reading a book about the Celts in the old days and the author was weighing our disgust for some of their customs—like eating horse—with our own ethnocentrism, and she decided that some Celtic customs were wrong, but that doesn’t negate the totality of Celtic culture. It’s a broadly applicable point. (And our own 21st century Anglo-American culture has more than one sticking point, too. If you felt like it, you could string them into a list.) The Christians were extremely uncharitable about the whole thing. Wrong rules/allowances about sex: that freaks me out; I guess I’ll have to blast as much of your culture as I possibly can manage into the waste-paper basket of history, you know. Or, just: (Lockhart holding the wand, about to do the Memory Charm) No, I looked for you in the Book of God, Harry; you’re not there—I suppose I’ll have to, well. But it won’t ~hurt; not really…. —Just such a joker thing to do, you know, to use people’s mistakes as an excuse to just, be done with them—because you never liked them to begin with.

…. Although I don’t believe in love charms (like the one depicted in the book): it’s “black” magic. But you should be able to figure that out for yourself, or at least willingly, you know. Because if you won’t, you won’t; there’s no cheating the law of choice, and the law of returns, if you like. You’ll choose and be compensated.

…. It’s also nice that it has queer sexual contact/stories—very independent, especially as it’s from a relatively early date, only a hair’s breadth past midcentury.

…. “as priest to priestess”

I cannot say yet that there is nothing in my story I do not like, though things work out now less ill than I once imagined it would be. The philosophers say not to put too much by touching, and there IS something of that in the old craft, after all. People touch; we are not made of stone—but there is only so much in it, and something in it that is rather different. If I had to say, I’d say almost that there is an impersonal layer, but that is not quite right. Of course, very unpersonable to say nothing of anything else, theologians, make much of that word “personal”, but even their avatar Christ said he was one with the Original God who in the Hebrew writings is only very rarely called a Father, and with a sort of Grey God called not too much of anything at all…. There is an impersonal layer beyond mere touch; touch, placed with too much trust, does not satisfy. But words do not give the real sense of it.

…. (Re: Gwen) Anyway, I remember that Richard Rohr talks about “Catholic” literally meaning “here comes everybody”, and how that’s what the Fathers meant by it, and he’s trying to be all optimistic and kind and imagining that everyone is like that and that can be a beautiful thing, but really, all “here comes everybody” really meant was, “we will bury you”, you know. (And yes, you need to slam the boot on the table for that one.) And yeah: Gwen wasn’t a Catholic, she was the Even More Advanced and Tolerant, “Celtic Christian”, you know. (laughs) (beer hall voice) “It gets way worse than this, buddy! Be grateful, dammit! Or else!”

…. It’s all a great wheel. Life repeats herself. I said similar things before once, but I did not mean them in the right way; I was deluded, so I had to change, but then the wheel turns, and I am where I was before, only I am higher up now…. Maybe that is why their Christ did not see fit to lay down the Perfect Aquinas Laws/Philosophy to Last Forever Unchanged, you know. He just gave the people what teaching they were at least almost ready for, and had some chance of fulfilling. What more can anyone do, even if he is a god?…. He must have known he would have had to come back again, anyway, and teach again…. Certainly there must have been many things that a god of love would have loved to say but back then, men could not bear it…. Anyway, their Christ is almost irrelevant to their church, so in a human sense it makes little difference, you know. Christians get so offended on behalf of their Christ; they imagine him as just being little own little psycho selves, only with grander delusions, a bigger ego, and infinite power and thirst-for-power. “How dare you insult my journey to Earth by not making it the central fact of your worthless existence!” But I do not think that true avatars view their own mission in quite the same way, you know. If they did, they would hardly be devas but asuras, really.

…. “little and dark, like one of the fairy folk” “the dark folk of Britain”

Wicca is not today the same religion it was a millennium and some centuries ago; however, it is my saying that Anglicanism was the religion that England gave to the world, and Wicca the religion that the world gave to England.

…. The non-initiates (what I guess today we would call secular) and the Christians or whatever, are also a part of the book, an important part….

…. I suppose sometimes the sons and the daughters of the Goddess are rather different….

Dark moon in Scorpio coming up, (laughs); I guess I’ll have to not even leave the house, not even leave the room, defs not do any spell work…. Of course, I couldn’t anyway, I wanted to thank the gods for my job and my car but I was going to do that after I got Mr Ken looked at one more time…. And I’d have to plan it first; so tiring with that eclipse, and then Halloween= candy sugar = no sleep…. When the moon starts to wax I’ll plan my thank you ritual; I’m sure Mr Ken is fine….

But yeah: girls are scary. And I guess you can’t always assume that you’re like them, really…. That really sunny feminism, Betty Friedan, we’ll just start a book club and read the better written bestsellers, and that will bring us all together…. I wonder if anybody ever believed that, lol?….

Poor girlie with her dark moon heart. 😸

Girlie= 😼

…. Although obviously it’s also pop paganism vs punk paganism, you know. I myself have almost always been a reformist, except I guess when I’ve been in my life angry beyond reason—whatever the issue—and sometimes in a mental way even then. On the other hand, I don’t think that preserving the bones of paganism while carefully burning its spirit is a thing of great merit, whatever the gloating smug historians of ‘kind’ and liturgical Christianity pretend. Today I think the situation is rather different, but I am no fond man of the whole behold-the-bones-of-the-past-kept-in-the-crypt-for-you, you know.

…. But yeah, lemme rewrite that the right way.

(Nimue kills Kevin.)
(Kevin) Ah! (dies)
(Morgaine and a couple other priestesses jump out of bushes) Surprise! We love you! You’re a favorite friend of ours! We make no demands on your time. You do you!
(Kevin) (not dead) Yay! :D
(Morgaine) You are dead though. We murdered you!
(Kevin) (now twice-dead) Ah….

And that’s just the way it should be.
(Reasonable girl) If she were in love with him, why would she murder him?
(narrows eyes) Silence!

…. It is interesting or whatever how rather more, much more, happens to Arthur & friends, than could have happened in a single ordinary human life, you know. I suppose that makes sense—in mythology you play a very big game, right. History in the large sense, and the clash of the archetypes, is your theme: you don’t turn away from a good plot point out of pious historicity, you know.

…. (cf the horses of Spain and Morocco) Wayne Dyer said something like this once—well, probably more than once—but even if you fear that you’re more racist than the average person, you shouldn’t immediately assume that everyone else, or the average person, or whoever, understands racism or anything else better than you. You might not understand something another does. But that is no reason to throw away your judgment or your right to choose. Many theologians blame all evil in the world on what little freedom there is, based on the metaphor of the apple, and their own crazy locutions about it. Really, racism owes a lot to improper deference, and many other evils beside. Many people name improper deference ‘faith’.

…. the rise of the patriarchies: the woman who collaborates is ‘the best of women’; the woman who doesn’t collaborate, dies.

And there are many patriarchies.

…. And Gwenhwyfar, the Christian Woman, is the neurotic goddess, you know.

…. And Morgause is un-initiate, morally un-initiate….

And Mordred is, just, Mordred, you know.

…. So yeah, that was a long book! I almost wish I had bought it, so that I could have stopped reading it, because it was too long…. And supported the author, because it was great.

But! I finished this book on Moon-day the 13th, while both the Sun and Moon are in Scorpio: this probably means that, girlie loves me, and together she’ll kill me, and I’ll learn, the most magical things. (It’s a new form of divination: kill your boy, and then talk to him after he dies to see what he finds out. “It’s a new art form, showing people how little we care, yeah-ah.”)

And one of those things could be that the Spanish horses called the place Abbalon….

…. Sometimes Gwen is almost sympathetic.

…. (Morgaine speaking) “None of us knows how (the Goddess) will do her will—only that it will be done.”

…. …. (end-piece:) Very flawed and crazy people can be spiritual geniuses, of whom the Apostle Paul was not the only one.

…. …. (end-piece 2) It’s really well written, like a sort of prose Shakespeare: actually more so, I think, than Jane Austen, who was called a “prose Shakespeare” by one of those old men. But I think I’ll have to remember to read some ordinary “witchy romances”, too, you know. It’s so tragic: everything so profound and everything so wrong…. It’s not always good only to mirror those tales of woe, you know. “Never was there a tale of more woe/Than this of Juliet, and her Romeo.” Same idea. Foolish people—that is, ordinary wise people—who roll around in bed a bit and come through the storm just fine and end up happy, are more to be envied than the tragic, profound people. But I’m glad I read it: far more so, in fact, than the Homer books, actually.

…. (end piece 3) Personal cycles, social cycles, sad stories, and hard women—lol.

…. (the red card in the last minute) Oddly enough, given the chronology, it’s obviously a little more relevant to my life than “Twilight”, you know: anyone can work a little magic if they’re willing to be a little unusual, but turning into a non-human monster isn’t a healthy choice. Still: I rather miss something like Stephenie’s pacing—long but not too long. Of course, “Mists” is better written in a lot of ways, and it is nice to see the whole spectrum of the life cycle, you know. But merciful Maia, maybe 20% shorter would have been okay?

…. (the penalty shot at the end) Morgaine is I think Starhawk, Starhawk Morgaine, and Marion likes her, and likes her perhaps the best; however, there is ambiguity in most novels, and especially third person novels, (although some first person ones, too), and ‘good’ novels, you know…. And Marion I suppose does not speak, herself, any more than most creative people do in their mirroring, right.

…. (the final score) I wonder what all the followers of their Christ would say, who never read ‘The Mists of Avalon’ and judge paganism based on what is written of it in the Bible, if I had never read the Bible, and judged the church of Christ based on what is written about it in ‘The Mists of Avalon’.

…. (the post game show) Howie, all we need now is a show about modern pagans called, “It’s Always Misty in Glastonbury”.
(irreverent come-back comment)
(back to the first guy) But first: these commercial messages. (they’re stuck smiling for too long before the commercials cut in)

The American sequel/spin-off to It’s Always Misty in Glastonbury could be called We Worship the Sun God in Philadelphia.

A brilliant retelling of the Arthurian legends from the female character's point of view. ( )

I loved this book a long, long time before I'd ever even heard of the Society for Creative Ananchronism. Still, it was fun to find out there were so many kindred spirits in the world. ( )

I am having trouble getting through this book... I keep putting it down and moving on to something else. Eventually, I hope to finish it. ( )

Great book on the Arthurian legend from the female point of view. Good long read. ( )

I adore this book, too bad the author was such a nasty woman because I learned so much from all her books. :( ( )

Of all of the retellings of the tales of King Arthur & the many other characters living in Camelot. this version grips you and without lecturing clears up all the little facts and relationships which have traveled between the many different versions. I finally have read what I believe to be a definitive story leaving all that needs to be answered. ( )

I was ...really weirdly attached to this book in middle school

The movie is almost exactly like the book, with the exception of the Aunt and mother who actually are more nuanced and dimensioned. ... The movie made them more evil or good when in reality they are more complex.

When I read this book there was such a longing for that place and time, it feels like historically accurate. Especially the conversion from a land and Goddess based life to a sky good religion. It was interesting to see that some characters supported both, or only the old religion or only the new.

This must have happened, the theological alliances. It opened my mind to become curious about how conversion to Christianity could have happened in the Celtic lands, and that the goddess does live today in subtle ways.

In a way, sad to see some of what we might have lost. ( )

What an interesting take on the Arthurian Legend! It's a long a complex story, but it held my interest straight through. I've read it many times. ( )

Despite all the press about this one, I thought it was just really average. Some of her other books are much better written. ( )

Lines like the following near the end of the book would not resonate if they had not been paid for each step of the way.

'Morgaine,' he whispered. His eyes were bewildered and full of pain. 'Morgaine, was it all for nothing then, what we did, and all that we tried to do? Why did we fail?'

King Arthur in his final moments is bewildered, the bewilderment of the beast at the moment of slaughter. He thought he was beloved by the world only to watch as his kingdom crumbled and his life blood ebbed, all as if fated.

Bradley is able to tell this whole sweeping tale of Arthur's reign and to capture the pity of it not just for Arthur, but for any of us who live long enough to see and understand and love things that have been built over time crumble into ruin and dust. Arthur asks his question for all of us.It is hard not to share his bewilderment and loss in one's very being.

Bradley has helped me re-see the tale of Arthur and Camelot as an ur-tale for what humans attempt to build in this world and the great arc of all these attempts in which the seeds of destruction and oblivion that are sewn in the moments of creation. Humans are fated to sow, to reap, and to destroy, to destroy even those things most beautiful things. For while there are creators, there are also those who destroy because they must or because they have lost all sense of what is good and worth preserving, those who walk into the sweep of history when things are as good as they might be who only have destruction to offer.

In her epilogue, Bradley allows Morgaine to attempt to answer Arthur's question, and I find it hard to believe that Bradley herself could believe that it would be satisfying or convincing. Morgaine says, 'You held this land in peace for many years, so the Saxons did not destroy it. You held back the darkness for a whole generation, until they were civilized men, with learning, and music, and faith in God, who will fight to save something of the beauty of the times that are past."

For me, this is too much to be hoped for. Had Morgaine said only: "You held back the darkness for a whole generation," this might seem a fitting answer, an answer, that is, fit to what is within the realm of possibility for any generation. For any generation, a holding action against the darkness might well be the best that can be hoped for and achieved. And that has to be enough because that is all there is. ( )

This is a big read. The story of the time of King Arthur, as told from the point of view of the women of the time. It's a familiar tale, but told with more depth and dimension than I'd experienced in any earlier telling.

There are cycles in the book in which I want to strangle pretty much every single character, but they are far and few between. If you're interested in Arthurian legends, druids, pagans, post-Roman Christianity, and/or long form fiction, I recommend this book. ( )

You'd have to like this to stay with it through 50+ hours. I was surprised how captivated I became. This has been on my list for years, but it never made it to the top. It is so long that I made it my New Year's Resolution. I'm glad I did. Davina Porter is a fabulous narrator. She really brought the story to life. Very interesting and challenging in some ways. ( )

This novel is much like the two settings it describes, the mythical/historical world of Camelot, and the mystical world of Avalon. The well known characters play out their roles more or less as you remember them from other writers, but the focus on the female characters and their experiences of these times led me into a seldom traveled land. I have read many of Ursula K. Leguin’s works, as well as Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, but The Mists of Avalon is a far more complete and complex exploration of the heart of the Goddess. I thought that the lack of battles and combat and action would make the story slow, but at just the right times lightning strikes. Start reading this work and let Zimmer enchant you. ( )

One of the most well written novels probably of the 20th century. But once you learn a little about the author it immediately puts you on the fence and your morals kick in. I tried so hard to just enjoy the story and forget about her and husbands actions...…..but It was impossible. It just got in the way of the story. ( )

https://nwhyte.livejournal.com/3765102.html

One of those classic works of fantasy which I must have first read soon after it was published in 1983, and which is now tarnished by association with its author's personal history of child abuse.

The novel has some merits, but it has deeper flaws than may be initially apparent. It's great to take a traditionally male story - King Arthur, Lancelot, Galahad, etc etc - and tell it mainly from the point of view of the women in the story, in particular Morgaine who is very much the villain of the original legendarium - Arthur's half-sister, mother of their incestuously conceived son Mordred who eventually kills his own father. The book is a thousand pages long, but doesn't drag; we know what the ending is going to be, but the journey there is exciting and somewhat magical, with three different versions of Glastonbury coexisting in parallel strands of the same geography, two of them accessible only by the adept.

But. A lot of readers took to the portrayal of lovely paganism in contrast with rigid and blinkered Christianity, and sighed when at the end the Christians largely won. But the portrayal of Christianity is much darker than the reality of the time. The sexually repressive arm of recent Christianity has been transplanted by Bradley to the Dark Ages. Actual research on medieval Celtic Christianity shows that it was much more relaxed, including saints who actually performed abortions. The key baddie, the puritanical bigot bishop Patricius, is obviously meant to be St Patrick, who is supposedly buried at Glastonbury (though Downpatrick will disagree). But the real St Patrick seems to have been relatively relaxed about sex; he was much more upset about theft and murder. One of his two surviving works is a letter pleading for the freedom of enslaved kidnap victims. (You can read what you want into his autobiography's allusion to an otherwise unidentified sin committed when he was fifteen). Even in my teens, I felt that Bradley's portrayal of him was rather unfair.

On top of that, the paganism espoused by most of the key characters is actually rather repressive too. Arthur and Morgaine conceive Mordred in a drug-fuelled pagan ritual which they are given no choice about participating in. Avalon's women have no more choice about which men they are given to than Camelot's women do; the only difference is that the Lady of the Lake personally determines the fate of her subjects in Avalon, whereas patriarchal Camelot is more diffuse. (And, gulp, a mother figure deciding who the young people in her care will have sex with, some of them well below what we'd consider the age of consent today, is very creepy given what we now know about the writer.) Avalon also fetishises virginity more than the Christianity portrayed here. (See this really good analysis by Alexandra Lindstrom, from 2005, on these and other points.) I hope that those readers who developed an interest in paganism based on this book were alert to the negative nuances as well.

So, yes, interesting to return to it after many years, but its flaws have become more obvious with time. ( )

Ugh, Gwenhwyfar. You're really effing annoying.

Everything's too simple.

I'll stick to my guilty pleasure of the made-for-TV movie. :) ( )