Take a photo of a barcode or cover
4.07 AVERAGE
4.07 AVERAGE
I asked my dad, a voracious Cornwell reader, if he had ever read this series. He said he'd read the first one, but didn't go any further because it was "goofy."
Goofy is probably not the word I would choose, but honestly I see what he meant.
This book wants to be an unvarnished, history-grounded retelling of what might lie behind the King Arthur stories we have today. You've got almost all the usual puzzle pieces (Merlin, Guinevere, Lancelot, etc.) but it's set in a Britain still on the long downward slide from the withdrawal of Rome, torn between paganism and Christianity, and battered by invading Saxons and internal strife. There's no real magic, just pagan rituals that might invoke the power of the gods OR might just as easily get their power from superstition and a couple of coincidental peals of thunder.
And really, the book succeeds at what it's trying to do. There's enough Arthur there that it's not just a gritty story of horrible war in 500 AD. And there's enough historical feel that it turns legend into something you can imagine having really happened.
I might be judging this book harshly not because this retelling is unenjoyable, but because the actual King Arthur legend itself is pretty unenjoyable. Yes, I love King Arthur above all things. Yes, I hate most King Arthur media. It's just horrible! Guinevere and Lancelot is horrible! Inevitable death and betrayal and a doomed slide toward deepening darkness is... not good! So yeah. There's definitely enough Arthur here.
There's also plenty of rape. There's brief but multiple references to pedophilia and homosexual rape. The paganism, I'm pretty sure, is what my dad was calling "goofy" and it kind of is? There's a lot of animal blood and people blood and urinating on things and entrails and chanting and rolling of eyes back in heads, etc. While Merlin was the best character in the book and had literally the only funny lines, he was barely there. Nimue, who I couldn't stand, was there all the time. Guinevere and Lancelot were horrible, and their whole thing was only just set up in this book, so I know the next one will be even worse in that respect.
And beyond any overtly unenjoyable pieces of the book... the whole book just grinds. The beginning is enormously slow, and even after the plot picks up it still took me forever to get through. Whole days of not wanting to pick it back up again after I set it down. I'll probably go on to at least give the first Last Kingdom book a try, but I'm definitely not going any further with this series.
Goofy is probably not the word I would choose, but honestly I see what he meant.
This book wants to be an unvarnished, history-grounded retelling of what might lie behind the King Arthur stories we have today. You've got almost all the usual puzzle pieces (Merlin, Guinevere, Lancelot, etc.) but it's set in a Britain still on the long downward slide from the withdrawal of Rome, torn between paganism and Christianity, and battered by invading Saxons and internal strife. There's no real magic, just pagan rituals that might invoke the power of the gods OR might just as easily get their power from superstition and a couple of coincidental peals of thunder.
And really, the book succeeds at what it's trying to do. There's enough Arthur there that it's not just a gritty story of horrible war in 500 AD. And there's enough historical feel that it turns legend into something you can imagine having really happened.
I might be judging this book harshly not because this retelling is unenjoyable, but because the actual King Arthur legend itself is pretty unenjoyable. Yes, I love King Arthur above all things. Yes, I hate most King Arthur media. It's just horrible! Guinevere and Lancelot is horrible! Inevitable death and betrayal and a doomed slide toward deepening darkness is... not good! So yeah. There's definitely enough Arthur here.
There's also plenty of rape. There's brief but multiple references to pedophilia and homosexual rape. The paganism, I'm pretty sure, is what my dad was calling "goofy" and it kind of is? There's a lot of animal blood and people blood and urinating on things and entrails and chanting and rolling of eyes back in heads, etc. While Merlin was the best character in the book and had literally the only funny lines, he was barely there. Nimue, who I couldn't stand, was there all the time. Guinevere and Lancelot were horrible, and their whole thing was only just set up in this book, so I know the next one will be even worse in that respect.
And beyond any overtly unenjoyable pieces of the book... the whole book just grinds. The beginning is enormously slow, and even after the plot picks up it still took me forever to get through. Whole days of not wanting to pick it back up again after I set it down. I'll probably go on to at least give the first Last Kingdom book a try, but I'm definitely not going any further with this series.
I've always admired Cornwell's writing, and his version of the Arthur legend is my favorite so far, so I'm looking forward to the next volume.
This book it is well written with an interesting take on the tales of Arthur unlike any I have ever heard before. The battle scenes were gory and exciting and the characters well formed and easy to imagine. The list of characters at the beginning was very helpful for there were a lot! I will be reading the second one and look forward to it.
I did , however, find some parts of the story tedious and hard to focus on and I also found the role of women in the tale quite a difficult read. Although I imagine the treatment of women to be fairly historically accurate there were points where I felt like the author over used examples of this horror and yet cast these scenes aside like they should just be accepted by the reader as background narrative. That is, until the end which was immensely satisfying to read and re-read…
I did , however, find some parts of the story tedious and hard to focus on and I also found the role of women in the tale quite a difficult read. Although I imagine the treatment of women to be fairly historically accurate there were points where I felt like the author over used examples of this horror and yet cast these scenes aside like they should just be accepted by the reader as background narrative. That is, until the end which was immensely satisfying to read and re-read…
There's plenty of praise out there for Bernard Cornwell's writing, so I won't repeat it. If you remotely enjoy historical fiction you'll probably enjoy his work.
I will, however, call something else out: even in this, one of his earlier works, Cornwell offers a masterclass in how to write a male-centric book with great female characters. They are flawed, they have horrible things happen to them, they reflect the mores of the time period, and yet they are not reduced to mere MacGuffins. They have plot arcs of their own, they grow and change and demonstrate internal lives and emotions and motivations of their own, and when they interact with male characters - even when serving the needs of male power fantasy - they do so on level and respectful footing.
Thank you for proving it's possible and making these wonderful books accessible to readers like me.
I will, however, call something else out: even in this, one of his earlier works, Cornwell offers a masterclass in how to write a male-centric book with great female characters. They are flawed, they have horrible things happen to them, they reflect the mores of the time period, and yet they are not reduced to mere MacGuffins. They have plot arcs of their own, they grow and change and demonstrate internal lives and emotions and motivations of their own, and when they interact with male characters - even when serving the needs of male power fantasy - they do so on level and respectful footing.
Thank you for proving it's possible and making these wonderful books accessible to readers like me.
lancelot being described as literally the best looking man he ever saw that’s so hashtag real
content warnings: warfare/violence (plenty of gore), off-page rape, vague sex scenes
and it’s possible i missed something because my mind wandered during the battles.
and it’s possible i missed something because my mind wandered during the battles.
Finally, it's done. Took longer than usual. Great story though. Based on historical events. Definitely want to read the rest of the trilogy.
I can see why Bernard Cornwell is considered a grand master of adventure/military historical fiction. The Winter King is my first book by him and it was mesmerizing. It’s a retelling of the myth of King Arthur, but one that strips out all of the magical elements to leave a gritty, earthy, epic tale full of warring kings and kingdoms of the British Isles who ally with and betray each other at will, political maneuvering to protect the realm of a child king, pagan religions and druidic mysticism trying to hold fast against the growing influence of Christianity, the ruins of the fallen Roman Empire, encroaching Saxon invaders, blood oaths of loyalty to one’s lord, and loads of battles, spears, swords, and death. It’s also something of a coming of age story for the main character and narrator Derfel, who starts off as Saxon orphan taken in by the druid Merlin after the sack of his village and who, after getting swept up in events surrounding the succession of the kingdom of Dumnonia, winds up as a spearman of Arthur (not a king but rather a bastard son of Uthur Pendragon), who is sworn to preserve and deliver the throne to the infant king Mordred when he comes of age.
I really liked how, removing all the magic from the myth, it allows for reinterpretation of the roles of all the familiar Arthurian characters. I particularly enjoyed the portrayal of Lancelot as, Guinevere as having interest and insight as a political player in her own right, and Merlin as a salty old man with an agenda that, if helpful to Arthur's goals at all, is only such by pure happenstance.
I even liked the frame story of Derfel as a monk in his old age writing the history of Arthur for his patron, the queen of Powys, and I usually hate framing devices in fiction. It really helps create suspense as to how Derfel went from warrior to monk, a question that has yet to answered by the end of the first book. It also provides a vehicle for the customary (magical) Arthurian elements to be first presented/discussed (by the romance-loving queen) and then re-contextualized within this new version of the tale.
I got the audio for this book, which was a huge help with the multitude of Welsh and Saxon people and place names, but the narrator, Jonathan Keeble, was incredible! He truly sold the story, with different voices for every character, huge range in emotional expression, and variations in his pacing and intensity that especially brought each battle scene to life.
I heard that this series is being adapted into a TV show and I can’t wait to see given how excellent the source material is. I'm also very excited to continue with books 2 and 3, which Keeble also narrates!
I really liked how, removing all the magic from the myth, it allows for reinterpretation of the roles of all the familiar Arthurian characters. I particularly enjoyed the portrayal of Lancelot as
Spoiler
a lying coward with really good PR; it was a surprising and amusing response to Sir Thomas Malory's incessantly exceptional self-insert OC from La Morte D'ArthurI even liked the frame story of Derfel as a monk in his old age writing the history of Arthur for his patron, the queen of Powys, and I usually hate framing devices in fiction. It really helps create suspense as to how Derfel went from warrior to monk, a question that has yet to answered by the end of the first book. It also provides a vehicle for the customary (magical) Arthurian elements to be first presented/discussed (by the romance-loving queen) and then re-contextualized within this new version of the tale.
I got the audio for this book, which was a huge help with the multitude of Welsh and Saxon people and place names, but the narrator, Jonathan Keeble, was incredible! He truly sold the story, with different voices for every character, huge range in emotional expression, and variations in his pacing and intensity that especially brought each battle scene to life.
I heard that this series is being adapted into a TV show and I can’t wait to see given how excellent the source material is. I'm also very excited to continue with books 2 and 3, which Keeble also narrates!
Definitely wasn't sure about this one at first. The hype was real, but I definitely wasn't really feeling it for the first 150 pages or so. It absolutely grew on me though!!
The Good:
- Surprisingly funny in parts. I loved the unexpected humor.
- Friendships. Love me a good friendship and they were around in spades in this tale.
- Definitely a different sort of take on Arthur and I am totally vibing with it. Every author takes their own spin on these characters, but I like the direction this is all heading.
- Very decent pacing after that intro bit that I wasn't sure of.
- Merlin fucking SENDS me every time he's on the page. What an icon. A legend. A petty asshole with a dark sense of humor and give no fucks attitude.
- Derfel took a while to grow on me, but grow he did.
The Bad:
- I wish people would quit spitting. This is why you've all got the plague.
- Pacing issues in the beginning for me.
- Sometimes the writing style can grate on me depending on what's happening, but that seems to be an unpopular opinion, so your mileage may vary.
Overall I really grew to enjoy this after about 150 pages of uncertainty. I'm really excited to see where this all goes, as the framing device used indicates that this all goes to shit at some point. Love that for us.
4-fuck-you-Lancelot stars/5
The Good:
- Surprisingly funny in parts. I loved the unexpected humor.
- Friendships. Love me a good friendship and they were around in spades in this tale.
- Definitely a different sort of take on Arthur and I am totally vibing with it. Every author takes their own spin on these characters, but I like the direction this is all heading.
- Very decent pacing after that intro bit that I wasn't sure of.
- Merlin fucking SENDS me every time he's on the page. What an icon. A legend. A petty asshole with a dark sense of humor and give no fucks attitude.
- Derfel took a while to grow on me, but grow he did.
The Bad:
- I wish people would quit spitting. This is why you've all got the plague.
- Pacing issues in the beginning for me.
- Sometimes the writing style can grate on me depending on what's happening, but that seems to be an unpopular opinion, so your mileage may vary.
Overall I really grew to enjoy this after about 150 pages of uncertainty. I'm really excited to see where this all goes, as the framing device used indicates that this all goes to shit at some point. Love that for us.
4-fuck-you-Lancelot stars/5
Finde das Buch nach wie vor ziemlich langatmig. 200 Seiten weniger wären besser gewesen .