From My Writing Reviewing Desk
I always intend to post on my website the reviews I write for Historical Novels Review and other print journals, but I usually don’t get to it. The courtesy rule is to wait for the print version to be available first and in the gap, I forget. So, I have a new plan to include occasional reviews as part my weekly posts. This week’s review is of a recent release of a truly great historical fiction writer, Bernard Cornwell. For the writers among you, there’s no one better than Cornwell to look at for models of how to write a fight scene, but that’s only one small part of his genius.
Sword of Kings: A Novel (Saxon Tales)
In Sword of Kings (affiliate link), the twelfth book in Bernard Cornwell’s popular Saxon series, Uhtred of Bebbanburg has grown older and wiser, but, much to the reader’s delight, no less prone to put himself and his men into danger. Despite this being a longstanding series, Cornwell achieves satisfying freshness with Uhtred’s current inner conflict and failings.
The reader shares Uhtred’s frustration with the trap he’s gotten into. He swore an oath to his companion in arms, Aethelstan. Now that warrior vies for the throne that the dying Edward will soon leave open, and it’s time to fulfill his oath. The last thing Uhtred wants is involvement in Anglo-Saxon quarrels. His wife and closest friend tell him he’s a fool to go south to help Aethelstan. He agrees. But breaking an oath—that’s a heavy thing for a man following the Norse gods. In Uhtred style, he finds a clever way to uphold his oath that might not be fatal—until that plan goes awry. One unforeseen twisty disaster leads to another, keeping the reader highly engaged watching Uhtred’s brilliant strategic thinking in action.
Along with Cornwell’s rich character development and consummate battle scenes, he’s the master of cliff-hanger chapter endings. There’s this classic: “…I had no business here. The fool’s errand was over. Except it was not. Because the horsemen came.” There’s another subtler and more character-driven one: “And I knew then why he was familiar and why he hated me. And that made me laugh. We limped on home.” Of course, the reader doesn’t know what Uhtred does and is propelled off the cliff into the next chapter to find out. Cornwell’s well-honed talents make for an addictive book that brings old friends to the page with compelling new dimensions. This review first appeared in Feb 2020 HNR
Archaeology I Enjoyed
An Imperial Look
Roman history buffs, this is for you. A photo gallery of the Roman Emperors reconstructed very convincingly with some fancy technology and excellent ancient art. I enjoyed going eye to eye with some of my favorite heroes and villains among these guys. Click here for Medium “Photoreal Roman Emperors Project”
I LOVE Cornwell’s Saxon chronicles. I have listened to every one of them on audio; great performances as well. I have not pursued his other battle series, but he is an exemplary writer: scene-setter, character builder, on and on.
Thank you for the review. And all you HF writers keep at it–we need to relish the past.
I LOVE Cornwell’s Saxon chronicles. I have listened to every one of them on audio; great performances as well. I have not pursued his other battle series, but he is an exemplary writer: scene-setter, character builder, on and on.
Thank you for the review. And all you HF writers keep at it–we need to relish the past.
Thanks for the vote for Cornwell. I was immensely pleased to receive that arc for review and obviously loved the book. I often read authors I’m totally unfamiliar with in order to discover new ones as I do my reviewing duties, but it’s a joy to read someone as deeply talented and well-honed as Cornwell.
Sometimes as a reviewer I have to work a lot harder to find the good in a book 🙂
I was defending my reviewing philosophy the other day to someone who wanted a more negatively negative review from me. I don’t do the snarky dump sort. Almost every book that’s undergone the basics of editing etc, which is true of all the ones that I read, has an audience that will enjoy it. I try not to be so arrogant as to presume if a book didn’t strike my immediate fancy that there’s nothing worthwhile in it for someone else. I’ll point out weaknesses, of course, but sometimes the best solution for me is to write a somewhat neutral description of what a book has in it, what I think the author has actually accomplished and let that speak for itself. The review will sound dreadfully negative to my ears because it’s not my sort of book, but I can’t tell you how often I’ve had the author tell me how glad they were I’d “gotten” what they were doing or a reader will tell me they were delighted to be connected to a book on X subject that they’d never have found otherwise. But Cornwell offers an unambiguously great read for me, and I find it hard to imagine any reader of historical fiction who wouldn’t love his books.
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