The Reavers

by George MacDonald Fraser

First published 2007

Amazon

3.2(700)

Lady Godiva Dacre is sent from Elizabeth I’s court to a remote Cumberland estate where the Anglo-Scottish border is controlled by reiver families, blackmail, feud and opportunistic wardens. Her arrival coincides with theft, accidental killing and a Spanish plot whose agents plan to exploit disorder in the Borders for a spectacular attack on the kingdoms of England and Scotland.

Godiva and an extravagant collection of allies pursue jewels, conspirators and one another through an intentionally anachronistic version of the Elizabethan world. The novel treats historical adventure as theatrical farce, combining Border riding, Anglo-Spanish hostility and court politics with modern jokes and deliberate impossibilities. Its setting remains recognisably the late-sixteenth-century Marches even as the narrative refuses realism.