Grisly Grisell

Grisly Grisell is a Victorian Medieval Romance, set during the War of the Roses. As a girl in the household of the Earl of Salisbury, she follows around Leonard Copeland to whom she is informally betrothed at the King's wish. But then he sets off a gunpowder explosion, which leaves her permanently disfigured.

Neither her fiance nor her parents want anything to do with her an she ends up under the care of a healer in a convent. She'd be more than happy to stay there, but outside events make that impossible and several years later, she is forced to make her way home, where she gains acceptance through her good heart and skill as a healer. Eventually, war resumes and her father brings home Leonard as a prisoner to make him marry Grisell. In show more love with another woman, he leaves without seeing her face during the wedding.

Fast forward a bit and they both end up in exile in Burgundy, where Grisell works for Leonard's benefit without telling him she's his wife. She hopes that he'll release her so that she can enter a convent instead of being a burden to him. As you might expect for a Victorian novel with a moral, in the end they all live happily ever after (except for the treacherous servant girl, of course).

As a side note, Yonge was a follower of John Keble and the Oxford Movement, so she's a bit more positive about medieval Catholicism than many of her peers, and Grisell almost comes off as a Catholic novel.

It's a fun, but definitely dated read, and the imitation medieval English can get a bit annoying. For those who want a taste, it's available for free on Project Gutenberg. show less