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Dangerous Gifts
Palmer Freeman returns from the Crusades broken in body and spirit. What he finds at home is a wife he never knew existed named Claire whose healer's arts are shadowed by a tragic secret. The harder she fights to restore Palmer to physical and spiritual health, the harder he lashes out at her. But can two people, disillusioned by life, find the most precious prize of all?
320 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published March 15, 1999
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
March 10, 2026
As I write this, there are only two other reviews currently on GR for this book. So despite my DNF tendencies trying to kick in halfway thru, I pushed thru so I could be Reviewer #3.
This is more of a simple medieval story, think Little House on the Prairie medieval-style, with a bit of betrayal by in-laws, heartbreak, and a romance that suddenly kicks into gear in the last half of the story. The storytelling is great, especially with rich details about the healing practices in and around the year of 1099 in England.
🗡️ Palmer - raised by the village healer, Nonna, left home with a group of men to join The (not-so-Christian) Christian Crusades. He is injured in Hungary (today’s Serbia), and returns home a few years later in shame over the conduct of his fellow crusaders. Upon arriving home, he discovers he has a wife that married him in proxy due his mother’s (non-malicious) trickery. He continues on with a mindset that he is not worthy and the heroine deserves better than him. The book blurb mentions that he lashes out at Claire. Maybe he snapped at her once, but he was far from being a grumpy, mean hero. He was calm, rational, and thoughtful yet had a severe case of PTSD from the crusades that left him depressed and racked with guilt.
👩🏻⚕️ Claire - having recently become a widow, she gets cast out from her home/castle by her evil brother-in-law, having to leave her 3-yr old son behind. She is taken in by the elderly Nonna and trained to become her apprentice in healing. She cares deeply for Nonna and takes care of her when she starts to mentally decline. Despite the tragedy of the last few years, she has a quiet calm about her and takes one day at a time, dreaming of if and when she could rescue her 3-yr old son from her in-laws.
35% - The hero finally makes his official appearance in the story. (In my opinion, too late.) There was no chemistry whatsoever upon any initial interactions with the heroine, I was beginning to wonder if Palmer was actually a side character. Despite the interesting set up to the story, I was starting to lose interest quickly as it was only revolving around the daily life of the heroine and blah feelings regarding a budding romance.
50% - Palmer and Claire finally start interacting a bit more, but still no slow burn or chemistry. Regardless of the absence of sexual tension, Palmer happens to experience sudden twitching of his manhood out of the blue. I’ve officially become indifferent towards the couple.
60% - First kiss and steamy sex scene, on a table. They accidentally enter the indoor swimming pool/bath area at the same time, see each other naked, she immediately overcomes her previous aloofness and starts lathering and scrubbing him down which leads to an urgent sex session, followed by him declaring he’s not good enough for her, and her demanding that the sex had to have meant something. As there had yet to be any real meaningful interactions or conversations, any longing looks, any sparks flying, etc leading up to this to support this sudden frenzied act of intimacy, the whole scene left me feeling icky, like I had just watched two strangers that I particularly didn’t care about going at it.
The remaining 40% of the story does improve, more interesting events going on in their daily lives, more healing and surgeries to witness, how the heroine tried to teach the importance of handwashing in medicine, drama in the background regarding the king and his younger brother, a small side romance of two teens from the village… and yes the romance btwn the hero and heroine did improve and finally became a sweet love story of healing, trusting and an overall happy ending with dreams coming true.
I first read and loved this story in the 90s and have kept it on my keeper shelf since then. I remembered nothing about the story. I’m glad I reread it as it was an interesting story but I will not reread again in the future, as I disliked the late timing of the hero entering the story and lack of any slow burn or sexual tension leading up to their intimacies
This is more of a simple medieval story, think Little House on the Prairie medieval-style, with a bit of betrayal by in-laws, heartbreak, and a romance that suddenly kicks into gear in the last half of the story. The storytelling is great, especially with rich details about the healing practices in and around the year of 1099 in England.
🗡️ Palmer - raised by the village healer, Nonna, left home with a group of men to join The (not-so-Christian) Christian Crusades. He is injured in Hungary (today’s Serbia), and returns home a few years later in shame over the conduct of his fellow crusaders. Upon arriving home, he discovers he has a wife that married him in proxy due his mother’s (non-malicious) trickery. He continues on with a mindset that he is not worthy and the heroine deserves better than him. The book blurb mentions that he lashes out at Claire. Maybe he snapped at her once, but he was far from being a grumpy, mean hero. He was calm, rational, and thoughtful yet had a severe case of PTSD from the crusades that left him depressed and racked with guilt.
👩🏻⚕️ Claire - having recently become a widow, she gets cast out from her home/castle by her evil brother-in-law, having to leave her 3-yr old son behind. She is taken in by the elderly Nonna and trained to become her apprentice in healing. She cares deeply for Nonna and takes care of her when she starts to mentally decline. Despite the tragedy of the last few years, she has a quiet calm about her and takes one day at a time, dreaming of if and when she could rescue her 3-yr old son from her in-laws.
35% - The hero finally makes his official appearance in the story. (In my opinion, too late.) There was no chemistry whatsoever upon any initial interactions with the heroine, I was beginning to wonder if Palmer was actually a side character. Despite the interesting set up to the story, I was starting to lose interest quickly as it was only revolving around the daily life of the heroine and blah feelings regarding a budding romance.
50% - Palmer and Claire finally start interacting a bit more, but still no slow burn or chemistry. Regardless of the absence of sexual tension, Palmer happens to experience sudden twitching of his manhood out of the blue. I’ve officially become indifferent towards the couple.
60% - First kiss and steamy sex scene, on a table. They accidentally enter the indoor swimming pool/bath area at the same time, see each other naked, she immediately overcomes her previous aloofness and starts lathering and scrubbing him down which leads to an urgent sex session, followed by him declaring he’s not good enough for her, and her demanding that the sex had to have meant something. As there had yet to be any real meaningful interactions or conversations, any longing looks, any sparks flying, etc leading up to this to support this sudden frenzied act of intimacy, the whole scene left me feeling icky, like I had just watched two strangers that I particularly didn’t care about going at it.
The remaining 40% of the story does improve, more interesting events going on in their daily lives, more healing and surgeries to witness, how the heroine tried to teach the importance of handwashing in medicine, drama in the background regarding the king and his younger brother, a small side romance of two teens from the village… and yes the romance btwn the hero and heroine did improve and finally became a sweet love story of healing, trusting and an overall happy ending with dreams coming true.
I first read and loved this story in the 90s and have kept it on my keeper shelf since then. I remembered nothing about the story. I’m glad I reread it as it was an interesting story but I will not reread again in the future, as I disliked the late timing of the hero entering the story and lack of any slow burn or sexual tension leading up to their intimacies
August 11, 2018
I loved the medieval medical stuff in this book. I'm passing it along for someone else to read.
October 17, 2014
good book
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews