Forbidden Gates

About the Book

King Edward the Confessor ruled England but was dominated by three great earls. Set in an age of violence, this story of Swegen Godwinson, heir apparent to the Earldom of Wessex, seeks to distill real life from the drama, passions, dreams, conflicts and romance implied in recorded traditions and the limited reporting of the Anglo Saxon Chronicles. Historic and imagined characters are presented for what might-have-been in times when treachery and murder were the weapons of opportunity in the unending struggles for power. England’s freemen waited and wondered, apprehensive of an ever-threatening Norman feudalism and a return of the still-dangerous Scandinavian Vikings.

This is the first of three novels from events in the years approaching 1066 when England achieved her greatest victory only to squander everything in a forced battle she might have won had covetous ambition not caused Rome to meddle and the country to be fatally betrayed.

About the Author

Retired U.S. Navy Captain James J. Lynch, while serving with U.S. and NATO Forces in Europe, became interested in Battle of Hastings lore. Continued studies and visits to historic places provide the basis for this first novel in a search for how the English managed to lose the critical battle that robbed them of King and Country.