The Charwoman's Shadow

The Charwoman's Shadow is one of Lord Dunsany's many early fantasy novels, and one of several works that helped shape the fantasy genre as it's known today. It blends historical romance with magic and magical creatures in a purported Spanish "golden age," a setting Dunsany also used in his earlier novel Don Rodriguez: Chronicles of Shadow Valley.

The Lord of the Tower and Rocky Forest, Gonsalvo, wants nothing but the best for his children, but the dire state of his coffers means a dowry for his daughter Mirandola's hoped-for wedding is little more than a dream. He does, however, have a plan: his own father, whose great love was boar hunting, had once been promised a favor by a magician he'd taught to hunt. If his son, Ramon Alonzo, can find this magician again after all these years, perhaps he can be tutored in the arts of alchemy and the transmutation of base metal into gold. With this hope, Ramon Alonzo sets off into the forest on a quest to learn the Black Arts.

Readers drawn to early, foundational fantasy-stories steeped in atmosphere, folklore, and old-world magic-will find in Dunsany's tale of ambition, sacrifice, and sorcery a charming and melancholy adventure.

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