The Flower of Clear Burning is the story of Clarence Winered, a man who does not know that he has married a witch - that is, until his wife Theresa tells him she must leave their peaceful happy village of Hillkirk for the forbidding forest of Havernon. She is taking with her the ancient and decrepit midwife Valla and the young barmaid Hanoli. They are going to search for a legendary flower with the supposed power to cure the plague, because the plague is coming closer day by inexorable day to the town of Hillkirk and its unsuspecting townspeople.
Theresa enlists the help of a foreign doctor, a dissipated prince, a forest knight and his mysterious lover in the hopes that together they might possibly succeed in their quest. In The Flower of Clear Burning, we are transported to fourteenth-century Northern Europe.
Theresa is a well-developed character. Clarence could be better developed, and the secondary characters seem one-dimensional. In some places the plot drags, but overall the storyline is interesting. At times, the dialogue comes across as stilted. The Flower of Clear Burning is a good effort. Not great, but definitely good.