My journey with Uhtred of Bebbanburg has finally reached its end with War Lord, the thirteenth and final book in one of the greatest historical fiction series of all time. I began my foray into Cornwell’s The Saxon Tales back in 2005. Thirteen books later, I’ve followed the life of Uhtred of Bebbanburg, one of…
Twelve books into his Saxon Tales series, Bernard Cornwall has delivered one of his best Uhtred tales yet in Sword of Kings. The novel combines the Game of Thrones-style politics of The Empty Throne with the desperate circumstances of The Pale Horseman. It’s a page-turner too, and I ripped through this book in a few…
It’s been more than a year since I finished reading War of the Wolf, the 11th book in Bernard Cornwell’s Saxon Tales series. For some reason, I never got around to writing a review. Perhaps it was the pandemic, which broke out right about the time I finished this book. But as they say, better…
As soon as I finished Ken Follett’s The Evening And The Morning, I dove headfirst into the final novel in his Kingsbridge series: A Column Of Fire. I’m glad I did—it might be the best one yet. A Column Of Fire stands out as markedly different from the rest of the Kingsbridge series. While The…
Hot on the heels of finishing Ken Follett’s World Without End, I devoured The Evening And The Morning, the gripping prequel to The Pillars of the Earth. The Evening And The Morning tells the tale of how the fictional town of Kingsbridge came to be. Many of the novels’ elements are similar to those in…
George R.R. Martin based A Games of Thrones on the Wars of the Roses, history’s real game of thrones. It was the Yorks versus the Lancasters, instead of the Starks versus the Lannisters, in a conflict over the English crown. And if you’re interested in this historical game of thrones, Conn Iggulden brings another chapter to life…
Since the New Year began, I’ve been busy writing my next novel, but I’ve also found myself missing Game of Thrones. If you’ve been missing it too, Conn Iggulden’s Wars of the Roses series might offer the perfect remedy. After all, the Wars of Roses were the real game of thrones. The Wars of the…
It look longer than I had hoped, but I finished reading The Flame Bearer, the latest installment in Bernard Conwell’s excellent Saxon Tales series about the founding of the kingdom of England in the early tenth century. Here’s my review. For ten novels – that’s right, ten – we’ve been waiting for Uhtred to reclaim…
As I edit away on my next novel, I have a suggestion for anyone suffering withdrawals since the season end of Game of Thrones: Watch a show about the War of the Roses, history’s real life game of thrones. It’s been well publicized that the historical War of the Roses helped inspire George R.R. Martin’s…
With only two episodes left in the second part of Season 4 of Vikings, I’m not a hundred percent sure where the show is going now that Ragnar’s death has been avenged. But I suspect the show will alter history yet again. The past few episodes of Vikings have embraced some of the more significant…
I’ll be the first to admit that part 2 of Season 4 of Vikings on History snuck up on me. But when I started catching up with the new half-season, I did not realize that Vikings was becoming a prequel to Bernard Cornwell’s The Last Kingdom. In fact, it seems, we can credit Ragnar Lothbrok…