Ellis Peters also wrote straight historical fiction under her real name, Edith Pargeter. She's pretty respected in terms of historical accuracy and I find these books much more enjoyable than the Cadfael's. It isn't that they're better in any other way than they're not mysteries - I hate mystery novels. In that respect, I liked the Jacobi series. Mysteries make better tv shows than books as far as I'm concerned. I also loved the Dresden Files series but found the books to be unmitigated bores
