I felt like this was a book of two halves. The first one is about how the Black Death comes to a small manor and how the quick thinking of the lady of the house saves the local families from becoming infected. This I liked, although I felt like I wanted more boils and suffering, and I guess you can understand in a time before tv/radio/news/internet how did small villages/towns/cities understand what was happening to them? The second part of the novel for me seemed a bit messy and was just leading into the next book. There does have to be a next novel, as the spoilt daughter needs to be taught a lesson that you sense is coming.
