Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! Voices from a Medieval Village
Schlitz, L.A. (2007). Good
masters! Sweet Ladies! Voices from a medieval village. Cambridge, MA:
Candlewick Press.
The book is full of monologues and dialogues of different characters living in 1255 in an English manor. There are 22 characters ranging in ages from ten to fifteen whose realistic stories intertwine with each other. The first monologue is Hugo, a lord's nephew, who runs from his tutor and chases a wild boar. Then Taggot, a blacksmith's daughter, who fears she won't be able to marry since she's "big and timid," and then sees Hugo as he hunts the boar and is enamored. There's also Constance, a pilgrim in search of St. Winifred's well to heal her crooked spine. There are also a few background sections with more detailed information between the character monologues, such as the one on the Crusades and falconry.
I listened to the audiobook version of this book and it was really a fun way to experience this book with each character's accents, the period music, and background noises. The forward is even read aloud by the author herself. The author wrote these monologues to be performed by the students at the school where she is a librarian and they are in fact perfect for students to perform out loud as a readers theatre. There's action and realistic adventure that teaches history much better than just by reading a textbook. I would recommend this for older kids, fifth grade and up.
Teacher's guide for Good Masters! Sweet Ladies!
Interview with Laura Amy Schlitz on School Library Journal:
Book Trailer for Good Masters! Sweet Ladies!
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