Capturing the stink and gore, violence and romance of medieval life, Iggulden makes real those grand characters who live in...
Iggulden (The Blood of Gods, 2013, etc.) rallies dukes and barons, archers and peasants, schemers and warriors in this first in a trilogy chronicling the 15th-century War of the Roses.
Henry VI, only 22, assumes England’s crown; he's "a dear white lamb to lead us in prayer"—the opposite of his warrior father—and he mystically believes hours of prayer keep France at bay. "Bring me a truce, Derry," he commands Master Derihew Brewer, once an archer and now the king’s spymaster. Brewer brokers a treaty with France’s King Charles and Duke René of Anjou for the marriage of the duke’s daughter, 14-year-old Margaret, to Henry in return for the English-held lands of Anjou and Maine. Powerful warrior royals like Richard, Duke of York, are opposed. Others, like William, Lord Suffolk, are ambivalent but loyal to the crown. The marriage is made, English protection is withdrawn, and the farms and settlements in Maine and Anjou become prey to the French. Worse, the collapse of those betrayed English bastions causes violent unrest in England. Giving color to various scenes and schemes, Iggulden skillfully depicts bloody clashes as English settlers fight, then retreat from Maine, Anjou and Normandy into Calais, followed by action-packed and nerve-racking street fighting when rebellious Kentish Freemen march into London. With Suffolk dead, the precociously intelligent and courageous Queen Margaret, along with other loyal lords, relies on Brewer’s scheming to secure the physically weak and emotionally damaged Henry. An heir is needed. Other lords conspire to name York Protector and Defender of the Realm. Iggulden superbly dissects the dogfight among Edward Longshanks’ descendants, but he also creates memorable fictional characters—in addition to Brewer, there's Thomas Woodchurch, an English archer–turned–Anjou wool merchant drawn back to the bow.
Capturing the stink and gore, violence and romance of medieval life, Iggulden makes real those grand characters who live in the collective memory. A page-turner sure to have readers eager for the next in the series.Pub Date: July 8, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-399-16536-8
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: May 6, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2014
At the outset, this might seem like minor Morrison (A Mercy, 2008, etc.), not only because its length is borderline novella,...
A deceptively rich and cumulatively powerful novel.
At the outset, this might seem like minor Morrison (A Mercy, 2008, etc.), not only because its length is borderline novella, but because the setup seems generic. A black soldier returns from the Korean War, where he faces a rocky re-entry, succumbing to alcoholism and suffering from what would subsequently be termed PTSD. Yet perhaps, as someone tells him, his major problem is the culture to which he returns: “An integrated army is integrated misery. You all go fight, come back, they treat you like dogs. Change that. They treat dogs better.” Ultimately, the latest from the Nobel Prize–winning novelist has something more subtle and shattering to offer than such social polemics. As the novel progresses, it becomes less specifically about the troubled soldier and as much about the sister he left behind in Georgia, who was married and deserted young, and who has fallen into the employ of a doctor whose mysterious experiments threaten her life. And, even more crucially, it’s about the relationship between the brother and his younger sister, which changes significantly after his return home, as both of them undergo significant transformations. “She was a shadow for most of my life, a presence marking its own absence, or maybe mine,” thinks the soldier. He discovers that “while his devotion shielded her, it did not strengthen her.” As his sister is becoming a woman who can stand on her own, her brother ultimately comes to terms with dark truths and deep pain that he had attempted to numb with alcohol. Before they achieve an epiphany that is mutually redemptive, even the earlier reference to “dogs” reveals itself as more than gratuitous.Pub Date: May 8, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-307-59416-7
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: March 4, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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PROFILES
This is historical adventure on a grand scale, right up there with the works of Conn Iggulden and Minette Walters.
Plenty of gore from days of yore fills the 12th entry in Cornwell’s The Last Kingdom series (War of the Wolf, 2018, etc.).
The pagan warlord Uhtred of Bebbanburg narrates his 10th-century adventures, during which he hacks people apart so that kingdoms might be stitched together. He is known to some as the Godless or the Wicked, a reputation he enjoys. Edward, King of Wessex, Mercia, and East Anglia is gravely ill, and Uhtred pledges an oath to likely heir Æthelstan to kill two rivals, Æthelhelm and “his rotten nephew,” Ælfweard, when the king dies. Uhtred’s wife, Eadith, wants him to break that oath, but he cannot live with the dishonor of being an oathbreaker. The tale seems to begin in the middle, as though the reader had just turned the last page in the 11th book—and yet it stands alone quite well. Uhtred travels the coast and the river Temes in the good ship Spearhafoc, powered by 40 rowers struggling against tides and currents. He and his men fight furious battles, and he lustily impales foes with his favorite sword, Serpent-Breath. “I don’t kill the helpless,” though, which is one of his few limits. So, early in the story, when a man calling himself “God’s chosen one” declares “We were sent to kill you,” readers may chuckle and say yeah, right. But Uhtred faces true challenges such as Waormund, “lord Æthelhelm’s beast.” Immense bloodletting aside, Cornwell paints vivid images of the filth in the Temes and in cities like Lundene. This is mainly manly fare, of course. Few women are active characters. The queen needs rescuing, and “when queens call for help, warriors go to war.” The action is believable if often gruesome and loathsome, and it never lets up for long.
This is historical adventure on a grand scale, right up there with the works of Conn Iggulden and Minette Walters.Pub Date: Nov. 26, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-06-256321-7
Page Count: 336
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Sept. 1, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2019
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