Bernard Cornwell’s epic story of the making of England continues in this eleventh installment in the bestselling Saxon Tales series—the basis of the Netflix television series The Last Kingdom.
If we were to use a baseball metaphor, we would say that the master of historical novels just hit another homer! It is masterful and intriguing! The author skillfully integrates actual historical figures with his fictional characters. Few authors are able to this as well as this author does ... book enthusiasts who have not read any of the books in this series will not only enjoy reading this book, but in all likelihood will check out their local book store or go online and purchase the first volume, The Last Kingdom ... an exciting tale with many twists and turns ... Cornwell is a master craftsman.
What keeps The Saxon Tales fresh? Bernard Cornwell does. He is simply a gifted writer and a mack daddy, master storyteller. It is as if every word he puts down on paper is the right word to advance the story. Cornwell's prose is vivid and evocative without being lavish. His plots are familiar but formidable. His settings are epic; even when Cornwell places his characters under a grove of trees for the night, it feels as if that is the place where legends are made. If Cornwell replaced Lord Uhtred with Bob Newhart, his books like War of the Wolf would still have a strangle-hold on the reader's imagination. In War of the Wolf, someone uses the term, 'lord king,' and I like that. So I will say that Bernard Cornwell is the 'Lord King of historical fiction.'
Once again, Cornwell has placed his irascible and cunning hero in the midst of personal and political conflict and provided another exciting story ... For those who enjoy their historical fiction told with verve and imagination.
