Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.84 AVERAGE
3.84 AVERAGE
informative
reflective
medium-paced
The author has a lovely immersive writing style, more reminiscent of GRR Martin than David Starkey, making what could otherwise be dry or encyclopaedic content engaging and accessible.
informative
slow-paced
Fascinating, readable and has helped me fill in big gaps of my ignorance. Williams squashes the stereotypes and gives us a comprehensive and complex vision of these immigrants and their interactions with the Anglo-Saxons. I am not sure how much my head will retain so may well again and will certainly seek out other sources of information. I listened to the audio version too which is very well read.
A fascinating and entertaining read focusing on the Viking presence in and influence on England. I really enjoyed the style of Williams' writing. He manages to bring a lot of life into the subject and allows for a more enjoyable, less strictly academic read.
I sometimes found the interludes of purely poetic fancy to distract from the subject and sometimes new chapters felt like jump cuts, but all in all a truly wonderful and informative read, especially with just criticisms of the existing primary sources.
I sometimes found the interludes of purely poetic fancy to distract from the subject and sometimes new chapters felt like jump cuts, but all in all a truly wonderful and informative read, especially with just criticisms of the existing primary sources.
informative
medium-paced
Just when you thought you'd read it all about the Vikings - even going so far as to go live in their homelands - a book like this comes along and you realise how little you really know.
Who doesn't love the Vikings? Everyone. Yes, even you. But how much about them do we really know? How much have we 'learned' from TV and film sources? Not the most reliable guardians of historical knowledge, I'm sure you'll agree. How much are we who we are, because they were who they were? Are they still to be found with us today? Or in us? It's with books like this, that we can come away from "Hey ho! Let's go a-raidin' - just because we can!" with smiles nestling in beards baloney, and once again touch base with facts - and new facts at that.
Viking Britain, does as it states on the cover and relate the story, in a kind of chronological time line as much as possible - given the need in many areas, to go off towards the rest of Europe and North Atlantic - analysing their history as it relates to their activities in and around Britain. That includes, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland. As I say, I have read many, many histories of the Vikings in my time, I know a bit, I'm no expert, so I need books like these as much as the next person. On starting, I did think 'do we really need another book about the Vikings?' Well, yes we do, with the regard to the fact that there are both new ways of recovering new evidence and new ways of looking at the evidence we have recovered, being developed all the time. Viking Britain uses many of these new strands of research to further develop ideas previously encountered, and also to go in new directions. It is always readable, thanks to the time-line style, developing like a story (or should it be Saga?) keeping your attention focussed on taking onboard what made the Vikings in Britain who we've become. You see what I did there?
There is still, I feel, something missing here. A look at the fact that the Vikings who came to England were from the same (rough) area as the Jutes who, along with the Angles and Saxons, had made the same journey a couple of hundred years before. Was there any residual memory? I'm not saying deja vu, more a realisation that save for a few hundred years apart, they were attacking many of their own ancestors' descendants! As did the Normans of course, in 1066. I'd like to have seen a look at that little nugget.
So, I'm thinking, how can a people who invaded Britain still be held by the British in such high regard, even loved? In a way the Normans - themselves descendants of Vikings - are not? They came, they plundered, they conquered large parts of the country, they ruled, they took half the population away to sell as slaves, and yet are still heroic fantastic fantasy figures. Their beliefs undergoing a resurgence. Unfortunately attracting a lot of the 'if you don't like it hit it with an axe and all the pseudo-bollocks, rent a meaningful statement, but really xenophobia, go out and conquer like the Vikings, but woe betide the bastards if they want to come and settle in your land, 'honour your ancestors' crap. Maybe it's their simplicity that attracts. Simplicity of their life, the seeming simplicity of their purpose - go, kill, raid, take. The answer is of course, that they were much more pragmatic than they are often given credit for, they came, liked what they saw, and stayed. Eventually being fully integrated and as British as you and I. They are in us now, in the way we look, the way we talk, and therefore in the way we think. Britain (especially) owes so much to the Vikings - we wouldn't be who we are now if they hadn't been who they were then.
The Book Blog: Speesh Reads
The Facebook Page: Speesh Reads
The Pinterest: Speesh Reads
Who doesn't love the Vikings? Everyone. Yes, even you. But how much about them do we really know? How much have we 'learned' from TV and film sources? Not the most reliable guardians of historical knowledge, I'm sure you'll agree. How much are we who we are, because they were who they were? Are they still to be found with us today? Or in us? It's with books like this, that we can come away from "Hey ho! Let's go a-raidin' - just because we can!" with smiles nestling in beards baloney, and once again touch base with facts - and new facts at that.
Viking Britain, does as it states on the cover and relate the story, in a kind of chronological time line as much as possible - given the need in many areas, to go off towards the rest of Europe and North Atlantic - analysing their history as it relates to their activities in and around Britain. That includes, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland. As I say, I have read many, many histories of the Vikings in my time, I know a bit, I'm no expert, so I need books like these as much as the next person. On starting, I did think 'do we really need another book about the Vikings?' Well, yes we do, with the regard to the fact that there are both new ways of recovering new evidence and new ways of looking at the evidence we have recovered, being developed all the time. Viking Britain uses many of these new strands of research to further develop ideas previously encountered, and also to go in new directions. It is always readable, thanks to the time-line style, developing like a story (or should it be Saga?) keeping your attention focussed on taking onboard what made the Vikings in Britain who we've become. You see what I did there?
There is still, I feel, something missing here. A look at the fact that the Vikings who came to England were from the same (rough) area as the Jutes who, along with the Angles and Saxons, had made the same journey a couple of hundred years before. Was there any residual memory? I'm not saying deja vu, more a realisation that save for a few hundred years apart, they were attacking many of their own ancestors' descendants! As did the Normans of course, in 1066. I'd like to have seen a look at that little nugget.
So, I'm thinking, how can a people who invaded Britain still be held by the British in such high regard, even loved? In a way the Normans - themselves descendants of Vikings - are not? They came, they plundered, they conquered large parts of the country, they ruled, they took half the population away to sell as slaves, and yet are still heroic fantastic fantasy figures. Their beliefs undergoing a resurgence. Unfortunately attracting a lot of the 'if you don't like it hit it with an axe and all the pseudo-bollocks, rent a meaningful statement, but really xenophobia, go out and conquer like the Vikings, but woe betide the bastards if they want to come and settle in your land, 'honour your ancestors' crap. Maybe it's their simplicity that attracts. Simplicity of their life, the seeming simplicity of their purpose - go, kill, raid, take. The answer is of course, that they were much more pragmatic than they are often given credit for, they came, liked what they saw, and stayed. Eventually being fully integrated and as British as you and I. They are in us now, in the way we look, the way we talk, and therefore in the way we think. Britain (especially) owes so much to the Vikings - we wouldn't be who we are now if they hadn't been who they were then.
The Book Blog: Speesh Reads
The Facebook Page: Speesh Reads
The Pinterest: Speesh Reads
informative
relaxing
sad
medium-paced
informative
slow-paced