One Corpse Too Many - Ellis Peters

I told you that I wouldn't be able to resist starting the next Cadfael novel before too long. I had to reserve One Corpse Too Many by Ellis Peters and have a read. As I think I mentioned before, this is the book that many people suggest you start with. Unlike the first book, the story takes place in Shrewsbury and we are introduced to a number of characters which I think appear in later novels.

The story is set around the siege of Shrewsbury by the King, Stephen, while the leaders of that town were supporters of the Empress Matilda (also known as Maud), who had a rival claim to the throne. The town soon falls and after many men are executed (which isn't dealt with in any graphic way) Cadfael is sent to tend to the bodies of the men and arrange Christian burials for them. Among the bodies, is the body of a man who clearly was not one of the executed soldiers, and is one corpse more than should have been there.

Cadfael sets out to discover the identity of the body and find out what happened. But this is not all that is going on. He finds himself with a boy to help him with his herbs and garden, but this 'boy' is in fact no boy at all, rather a girl in hiding, something which Cadfael quickly spots. Not only must he keep her safe from the Kings men in the area, he must also hide her from the man she was previously betrothed to, Hugh Beringar.

As the story progresses Cadfael admires Hugh Beringar's cunning and skill and although he is not at all sure of his motives or if he is at all trust worthy, he certainly appreciates him as an adversary.

Again the story was entertaining to follow and although I did wonder as to the idea of the killer before the end, they were only one in a cast of many that I suspected before the final review. I think that I'll be reading another one in the not too distant future, I think that the Cadfael books are a series that I'll be following this year.

An alarming discovery

We've always been really careful to make sure that we have working smoke alarms. The children all know what to do if there was a fire. We've talked about how to get out safely, where to meet, who to call. They've learnt the same at school. Our kids are firewise; they know to get down, get low, get out.

Except, they don't. If you'd have asked me a week or so ago, then I would have said that it wasn't a problem. I was wrong. Fortunately, we didn't find out the hard way, but we had a bit of a wake up call all the same.

Just the other day, the kids were all in their rooms. The youngest having a nap, the others chilling out, reading books and relaxing. I was in the kitchen cooking lunch and I set the smoke alarms off. Now this isn't a regular occurrence in our house, but it has happened before. Even so, not one of the children came out to see if there was a problem. Not one of them left the house, just in case. They assumed it was a false alarm and did nothing.

The problem is of course, that it's human nature to assume that all is well. That the worst won't actually happen and that everything will be ok. If there was a real emergency, then of course we would get the kids out, shout them to leave their rooms, make sure that they were safe. But that's not really the point. An emergency is just that, anything could happen meaning that we weren't able to do that. We teach the kids what to do in an emergency so that they will actually do it.

You can teach your children what to do, but until it actually happens, there's no way of knowing if they really will do it. We talked to them, explained that if they hear the alarm they must always act as though it's a real emergency, just in case it is. Even so, I'm less confident than I was. Some day soon I'll be testing them though, setting off the alarm and seeing what happens, making sure that this time they really do get out. 

How would your children react? Would they really act as though it were real? Or just assume that it was a false alarm? It's worth finding out, so that you don't have to learn the hard way.