This perceptive survey of the two faces of prolific and award-winning author Edith Pargeter explores both her life and her work. Pargeter is best known as Ellis Peters, the author of the Chronicles of Brother Cadfael. These 20 novels have been televised and adapted for radio and have played a major role in turning crime writing into a literary genre and making historical detectives popular. Also discussed are Pargeter's series of 14 Inspector Felse novels, written under her real name, and her further novels, including two outstanding historical sequences. The Brothers of Gwynedd quartet and The Heaven Tree trilogy. The Eighth Champion of Christendom, a trilogy of novels about the Second World War, is also illuminated.