My medieval novel, TIME ENOUGH TO LOVE, is the story of knights in the service of King Edward III of England. Knights are perhaps the iconic image most readers have of the period. The men didn’t, however, spring fully ready at birth for this way of life. There were years of training and hard work that went into becoming a knight. After the fall of the Roman Empire, old Roman families became rulers of their own land holds, usually a castle and a certain amount of land. These lords depended on the strength of their retainers, arms-bearing men who swore fealty them and lived within their households. This is the beginning of the knightly social class who became defined as warriors on horseback. In return for their service, the lord would usually give the knight a small parcel of land or fief, with authority over the peasants who worked the land. This authority led to the knight’s elevation into the ranks of the nobility. Training to be a knight began actually at birth. Male children who were not destined for Holy Orders, began learning at his parents’ home what is expected of a knight, good manners, and the code of…

When I began to think about the title for the third book of my medieval serial novel, Time Enough to Love, I had a rather difficult time coming up with one that continued in line with the first two novellas, BETROTHAL and BETRAYAL.  Those titles came immediately to mind because the words exactly explained the plots of the books. The final installment, however, was more complex, with more complications. So trying to find a word that began with “Be” became rather daunting. I grabbed a dictionary and went down the columns of “be” words.  It wasn’t a pleasant experience, because the longer I looked, the more I believed I would never come up with a title that would continue the alliteration of the first two and reflect the meaning of the book itself.  When I arrived at “beleaguered” it took me a second to think about it.  It was longer than the other two, it didn’t roll off the tongue as easily as they did, and it didn’t really scream romance novel.  But it did begin with “be” and the definition fit the book perfectly. Beleaguered, according to the Oxford Dictionaries, means “besieged, lay siege to, under attack,” and “hard…