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"New York Times bestselling author Bernard Cornwell returns to his epic Saxon Tales saga with The Pagan Lord, a dramatic story of divided loyalties, bloody battles, and the struggle to unite Britain.At the onset of the tenth century, England is in turmoil. Alfred the Great is dead and Edward his son reigns as king. Wessex survives but peace cannot hold: the Danes in the north, led by Viking Cnut Longsword, stand ready to invade and will never rest until the emerald crown is theirs. Uhtred, once Alfred's great warrior but now out of favor with the new king, must lead a band of outcasts north to recapture his old family home, that great Northumbrian fortress, Bebbanburg.In The Pagan Lord, loyalties will be divided and men will fall, as every Saxon kingdom is drawn into the bloodiest battle yet with the Danes; a war which will decide the fate of every king, and the entire English nation"--… (more)
User reviews
The first scene drew me right in. It's hard not to be interested when that's the first thing that happened.
The fights were very well done, and I appreciated Uhtred's commentary and the great detail that went into the emotions behind each of the battle charges. I also enjoyed the fact that Uhtred was basically a narrator with nothing, and that he had to trick his way to victory through most of the book. Highly entertaining.
Uhtred himself was a great character. A scoundrel, yes, but one that was easy to root for.
Overall, a great read. I'd never read anything by Bernard Cornwell before, nor have I really read about this period in English history. I liked it's somewhat similar flavor to the sword-and-sorcery stories I'm fond of, but there's less magic, of course (but still a touch of some). I'll probably go back and try this series from the beginning.
Everyone else in the story hates Uthred(our main Uthred) well apart from a couple of the other Uthred's, Finan(who is a legend and deserves his own stories), Aethelflaed, who loves him but has issues with him because of his actions and his men, well some of them leave him but it's not hatred at least.
The leader with the name that can lead to problems in an audible version Cnut is back and he's out for our Uthred and probably the other ones as well.
The fate of Ragnar is briefly mentioned as well as Brida's feelings towards Uthred, I bet you can't at guess how she feels!
Anyway, even though everyone hates Uthred, we all know that when the Saxons are threatened by the Danes, then Uthred won't stay away and so we have a game of cat and mouse amidst The tale of Uthred's. And quite a worrying ending as well.
Role on Book 8 - The Empty Throne, I wonder how many Uthred's we'll have in that one.
The book starts with Uhtred demoting his son, Uhtred, to Judas (he became a Christian priest) and upgrading his second son to Uhtred. It's similar to what happened to him when his own older brother was killed in battle and his father promptly renamed him. After losing Bebbanburg (Bamburgh) castle to a treacherous uncle, Uhtred has spent his whole life trying to reclaim his birthright. He comes close this time, but can't quite pull it off while once again, duty to the Saxons call. His former sire, Alfred the Great, has been dead for several years now, but Uhtred still has a thing with his daughter and pledges to help protect her worthless husband's territory of Mercia against Danish incursion.
The book is filled with delightful slurs as a prelude to battle (or in general conversation with church folk). The climatic battle is based on one that was fought but poorly documented, the perfect setting for making a fictional book seem authentic. Cornwell ended with a cliffhanger...but then spilled the beans in his historical notes following the book. Ah, well, the good thing is Uhtred will be swinging his sword Serpent-Breath again. The enemies list is getting smaller...perhaps one day he will get his castle back.
I know folks who just can't get enough Cornwell. Maybe it's
It goes wrong for Uhtred, the 'Pagan Lord' of the title, from the beginning (actually, I’d like BC to give us an idea of how we’re supposed to pronounce ‘Uhtred’ in our heads while we’re reading this. Idea?) Uhtred goes to try to capture his son, to stop him from shaming the family name and becoming a priest. Of Christ, not Uhtred’s Odin. Uhtred is, understandably for an old-fashioned, died in the wool Viking, somewhat less than chuffed at this development. He tries to reason with his son, threatening to cut him off, as it were, but he instead almost accidentally manages to kill another priest. As you do. Uhtred most likely normally wouldn't lose much, if any, any sleep over this sort of thing. But it isn’t the sort of thing that is going to endear him to his Christian neighbours. To make matters worse, he then returns home to find his hall has been attacked and burnt to the ground by Cnut Longsword, while he was away. He decides to meet with Cnut, only to find that Cnut thinks Uhtred has taken his (Cnut’s) wife and son. Which he hasn’t. And he suspects a double-cross. He returns home to find his peace-loving Christians neighbours have burnt down what remained un-burnt from the last burning. As you do in 10th Century pre-England. So, as he can’t convince anyone to trust him when he says there is treachery afoot, Uhtred’s not in the best of moods at the start of 'The Pagan Lord'. Dark days for Uhtred and it doesn’t get much better.
Dark days indeed. And whaddaya know? There’s bad weather. Nearly all the time. Cornwell clearly wants us to get the message that the weather matches Uhtred’s mood. But that really is a bit too obvious for a writer of his calibre, isn’t it? And it’s all the bloomin' time. I could be wrong on this but, I can’t actually remember there being good, or even fine, weather in any of Bernard Cornwell 'Warrior Chronicles' books. And there isn’t here. For instance, when he’s sailing off in his ship, 'Middleniht’, there's 'grey sea, grey sky and a grey mist, and the 'Middelniht' slid through that greyness like a sleek and dangerous beast.' I'm all for the weather as a way of mirroring a mood, but when it's all the time, the time comes when you have to say 'enough already with the dreadful weather!' Obviously it’s England we’re talking about here, so it is going to rain more than most places in the 10th Century, but they had sunshine back then as well! Even in the North Sea. It was on occasion dry and mild in the 10th Century, the sleet in the middle of summer didn't always come at you horizontally. But when the book opens with 'A dark sky. The gods make the sky; it reflects their moods and they were dark that day. It was high summer and a bitter rain was spitting from the east. It felt like winter’, you just think ‘oh, here we go again’. Actually, the only time I can think of in 'The Pagan Lord’ when he gets good weather, is when he actually wants bad weather! Obviously as cover for a dastardly deed.
Having said all that, the weariness, as befits an old man - old for the Viking age anyway - the ’not again, I'm too old for this shit’ of Uhtred, is outstanding. Understandable, given his luck with Christian sons - Christians on general - and inflammable barns and houses, really. He’s a believable and sympathetic character and one Cornwell obviously loves. That comes over loud and clear. Uhtred is, if I’ve read rightly and with only a couple of historical ‘adjustments’ along the way, an ancestor of Cornwell's. Would explain why.
So, my really big problem with this one?
And.
And. And, and, and. And. Ands, every-bloody-where. In sentences, starting sentences, linking sentences. Ands after commas. Ands starting paragraphs, for goodness' sake.
And way too many of them.
Cornwell achieves the matter of fact, authoritative style of Uhtred’s narrative, through using 'and' as a link in sentences. Like this:
"He (Æthelred) wanted the poets to sing of his triumphs, he wanted the chronicles to write his name in history, and so he would start a war, and that war would be Christian Mercia against Christian East Anglia, and it would draw in the rest of Britain and there would be shield walls again.”
Makes events that follow an and appear inevitable, no other outcome could possibly have happened. Makes it seem like the character of Uhtred is very decisive, knowledgeable and authoritative. Fine a few times. However, the constant, almost metronomic use of ‘and’ like that and too much, becomes irritating. And, time and time again - like the bad weather - enough! Try another approach once in a while. It really became a problem for me reading the book. Like it was standing in the way of my enjoying the book to the full. Like I would have done, if there were less ands. In the end, I was looking out for them and becoming more and more irritated. Starting sentences with an and is wrong, grammatically. You know it. Starting a paragraph with one is a real no-no.
"And I was a warrior, and in a world at war the warrior must be cruel.”
Like that. Still on the statute books as being punishable by a blood-eagle, if I’m not much mistaken. Unless you’re writing advertising copy. Then it’s ok. But this is a book, a decent one, this is Bernard Cornwell and he should know that it’s not ok.
And because he used it as a device so frequently, without seeming to even try to consider the maybes of any other kind of approach, is why I felt he was on autopilot, not really worried or thinking about it. Maybe he was thinking of the next Sharpe? I think if you only read Cornwell, you’d imagine that this is both how Historical Fiction is done and as good as it gets. Anyone who has read a few of the (now) many (many) other excellent writers on Cornwell’s block, like me, know different. Like I said, this is good, but while there is much to admire and recommend, I still came away from it feeling it could have been better. I’m no writer (that’s not news to you?), so I couldn’t for the life of me tell you how he should improve, but I just put it down at the end - even with the bombshell - and thought ‘ho-hum, autopilot’.
Uhtred
The story moves at a fast pace, blending humour with the graphic action, also leaving space for contemplation. Confrontation of all varieties, be it physical or verbal, is expertly portrayed.
In my view, what prevents Mr Cornwell from being an even better writer than he is already is, is his dialogue attribution. The actual dialogue is excellent, but for 90+ per cent of the time he interrupts the flow by needlessly reminding the reader who’s speaking, more often than not inserting this pointless information – pointless because it’s obvious who’s speaking – in the middle of sentences.
Mr Cornwell maybe doesn’t realise that the strength of his characters make it clear to the reader who’s talking, just as he fails to grasp how irritating it is to have his well-written dialogue swamped with superfluous attribution, which sometimes includes unnecessary adverbs.
Below is a quote between Uhtred and a female character, which serves as an example of needless attribution, because with the exchange being held between the narrating character and a female character it’s plain who’s speaking:
‘And you, my lady, are?’ I asked gently.
‘I am Frieda.’
‘If you have ale,’ I said, ‘we can pay for it.’
‘Not steal it?’
‘Pay for it,’ I said, ‘and while we drink it you can tell me why I have crossed the wrong sea.’
I also dislike the author’s elements of English style in the most part, especially his overuse of the word “then” – arguably the laziest choice for moving a story forward – and the amount of long-winded sentences he uses. Some of his books are worse than others for these annoying traits.
I feel these Saxon stories are least affected by poor style, though maybe that’s owing to them being his strongest works (in my view), thus I don’t notice the weak elements so much.
Anyway, style aside, Mr Cornwell’s done a good job with the story of "The Pagan Lord". I also liked his author’s note at the end, as the “genesis” of England through to the conquest doesn’t receive much attention in popular culture, any more than it did during my school years.
Alfred is dead. Edward does not
This novel is the shortest of the series, so far. But the battle scene near the end is, without doubt, one of the best. This series continues to keep me enthralled.
The story opens with the protagonist's holding burned and destroyed, his wife and children
When of course that mission fails, and he is now well and truly broke and broken, he again instead of rebuilding his holdings, he charges off on another wild and hopeless rampage to take a fortified town. And guess what? That mission also fails, so that he's in even more dire straits and barking about it to anyone who will listen.
The whole novel is like this. For a while I thought perhaps I'd missed the point, and Cornwell was in fact writing satire. But no.
And so no to the remainder of the series, given how badly this novel devolved into nonsensical rambling.