In his acclaimed Sunday Times top 10 hardback bestseller, Giles Kristian brings the epic story of the most celebrated of King Arthur's knights roaring to life as never before.
Family history (he is half Norwegian) and a passion for the fiction of Bernard Cornwell inspired GILES KRISTIAN to write. Set in the Viking world, his bestselling trilogies 'Raven' and 'The Rise of Sigurd' have been acclaimed by his peers, reviewers and readers alike. The novels The Bleeding Land and Brothers' Fury tell the story of a family torn apart by the English Civil War and he co-wrote Wilbur Smith's No.1 bestseller, Golden Lion. In his new novel, Lancelot, Giles plunges into the rich and swirling waters of our greatest island 'history'- the Arthurian legend. Giles Kristian lives in Leicestershire.
It is a masterpiece in the true sense of the word.
*CONN IGGULDEN, author of The Falcon of Sparta*
Some of us grew up with T H White’s Once and Future King as our
touchstone for authenticity in the Arthurian myths; others found
that Rosemary Sutcliff, Bernard Cornwell or Mary Stewart filled
that role. Giles Kristian pulls together the best of the best and
infuses it with his own utterly transformative understanding of
myth, magic – and the many faces of love . . . There are so many
modern retellings of the Arthurian myth, but this one stands head
and shoulders above the rest, in the company of true greatness.
*MANDA SCOTT, author of Boudica*
Without doubt this is Giles Kristian’s finest novel to date.
Glorious. Tragic. Lyrical. Totally gripping. I loved it.
*BEN KANE, author of Clash of Empires*
This most fascinating character from Arthurian legend has been
plucked from the 14th-century romances and positioned firmly back
in the early medieval environment he belongs in. Giles is an
extraordinary writer, able to capture sounds, smells, sensations in
a sentence. No other writer thinks and feels his way back to the
medieval past the way he does . . . Lancelot is an exceptional book
and does what only great historical fiction can do: transport you
back through time to feast, fight and feel alongside fascinating
characters from the past. No one does this better than Giles
Kristian.
*DR JANINA RAMIREZ*
A gorgeous, rich retelling of the Arthurian tale.
*THE TIMES*
I loved the post Roman chaos of Giles’ vision, just as I imagine it
would have been but with the life of that vision breathed into it
to render it in stark and bloody tones. But what I enjoyed most was
the sheer glorious brutality of the age, delivered by a writer with
the heart of a warrior and the soul of a poet. It’s really, really
good.
*ANTHONY RICHES, author of The Centurions series*
His Lancelot is no airy tale of magic and romance, but a muscular
telling of warriors and survival, beautifully rendered in a prose
that is both visceral and lyrical. This is historical fiction at
its very best.
*ELIZABETH FREMANTLE, author of The Girl in the Glass Tower*
Intense and powerful . . . written with deep expression and
enormous feeling. It is a marvellous historical adventure.
*Sunday Express*
Kristian is a writer with rare power to grab you at the opening of
the story and to keep the pace going. Lancelot is a powerful
reworking of the King Arthur myths. The pages turn by
themselves.
*JUSTIN HILL, author of Viking Fire*
My impression as I was reading Lancelot was of a flare being held
up in the gloom of this peculiarly dark passage of history. Every
detail illuminated, every motive believable, every heart laid bare.
A bright intensity but passing away, guttering, about to go out.
And, by the time his tale comes to its conclusion, that seems to be
his point. A gentle lament at the onrushing of a dark and
inexorable tide which comes to extinguish a bright and golden age
of Britain forever. Lancelot is a gem of a book. If there were six
stars, it could have them all. Or, to use the words of Spinal Tap,
“This one goes to eleven.” Loved it.
*THEODORE BRUN, author of The Wanderer Chronicles*
Truly magical . . . reads with the authority and gravitas of Manda
Scott's Boudica books, such that I found it utterly believable
throughout . . . it was a stroke of genius to retell this legend
through Lancelot's POV, the betrayer rather than the betrayed.
*ANNA STEPHENS, author of Godblind*
Giles Kristian’s brilliant take on the Arthurian love-triangle is
impressively fresh and original . . . the language is arrestingly
beautiful, poetic and poignant; the fights are satisfyingly bloody;
the background is a believably muddy, pagan and benighted
post-Roman Britain, against which Giles unfolds a tender and tragic
love story. We know it will end badly, but reading this enchanting
and elegiac novel, you can’t help rooting for Lancelot and his love
and hoping it will all work out somehow by the final page.
*ANGUS DONALD, author of Outlaw*
Authentic, epic, and wonderfully Arthurian.
*CHRISTIAN CAMERON, author of The Ill-Made Knight*
Kristian is one of the finest storytellers in the genre . . . this
is a novel that you feel as much as you read. What we end up with
is utterly staggering . . . Giles has surpassed the Cornwell
trilogy in a single title.
*Parmenion Books*
Fiercely beautiful and gripping.
*ANNA SMITH-SPARK, author of The Court of Broken Knives*
It’s difficult to think of any author more gifted to retell
Lancelot’s story than Giles Kristian . . . [he] writes so
beautifully. He brings these post-Roman years so vividly to life. I
love the way in which the recent Roman past haunts this landscape.
There is myth here, there is the Druid Merlin, and we’re reminded
of many of the famous Arthurian legends, such as Excalibur, but
Giles Kristian evokes a time rooted in history and in the land
around us even now . . . his writing comes closest to the feeling,
mood and beauty of the Old and Middle English verse that I love so
much . . . there is power here, deep expression and enormous
feeling. I cried and cried as the story ended in the only way it
could.
*For Winter Nights*
 |
Ask a Question About this Product More... |
|
