New Review for Her Perilous Game

14th century. Christina Kohl has inherited her father’s Hanseatic League trading business, and is posing as her dead brother Frederick to avoid the limited fate of women, marriage and family. After a successful trip to Bruges to sell wool fleeces, Christina is called to attend King Edward II, who wants to borrow money for his war against the Scots. Unsure of how to respond, she seeks the advice of Herr Revele, head of the London Hansa merchants. Since he’s ill, she instead must see his daughter Katharine, who bears a grudge: “Frederick” had turned down an offer of her hand in marriage, and Katharine increasingly sees Christina as an adversary rather than a fellow foreigner trading colleague.

In the previous volume, No Man’s Chattel, Christina had become friends with Piers Gaveston, the King’s favorite courtier, who knows her true gender. Now a plot arises that threatens Gaveston, and Christina is asked to use her ship to take a message to him near the Scottish border. Gaveston has many enemies who are jealous of his access to the King, and Christina and her men fall into a trap: she is imprisoned and threatened with torture.

Swanson is a European history scholar and incorporates interesting slices of 14th-century life, such as medieval personal hygiene, how sealing wax was used, and what it’s like to witness a bedding ceremony. In volume one, Christina trained in fighting techniques under a knight, so when danger threatens her in this one, she doesn’t have to wait for a man to rescue her. She is attracted to women rather than men, so her character provides a role model for today’s readers in search of gay heroes and heroines in history. I enjoyed learning about medieval trade, and it’s novel to have a merchant heroine to root for. Recommended.