Finding a truly good historical novel is like finding a rare gem. The House of Walderne A Tale of the Cloister and the Forest in the Days of the Barons' Wars was written by Reverend A. D. Crake. The author weaves a tale mixing fact and fiction and including real people and those of his imagination. The castle of Walderne is a real place although now in ruins. The story begins "It was an ancient castle, all of the olden time; down in a deep dell, sheltered by uplands north, east, and west; looking south down the valley to the Sussex downs, which were seen in the hazy distance uplifting their graceful outlines to the blue sky, across a vast canopy of treetops; beneath whose shade the wolf and the wildcat, the badger and the fox, yet roamed at large, and preyed upon the wild deer and the lesser game. It bore the name of Walderne, which signifies a sylvan spot frequented by the wild beasts; the castle lay beneath; the parish church rose on the summit of the ridge above--a simple Norman structure, imposing in its very simplicity." Crake has given his reader two heroes. One man is a noble man of chivalry. The other represents all that is good in the church.