A work of historical fiction this time around, one that comes highly recommended by a number of fantasy booktubers.
My reviewer criteria. I like light, entertaining novels. I like smaller scale stories rather than epics. I like character focused novels featuring pleasant characters, with a minimum number of unpleasant ones. I greatly value clever and witty writing. I like first person, or close third person narratives. I dislike a lot of "head jumping" between POVs and flashbacks. I want a story, not a puzzle. While I am not opposed to violence, I dislike gore for the sake of gore. I find long and elaborate fight, action, and battle sequences tedious. Plot holes and things that happen for the convenience of the author annoy me. And I fear I'm a born critic in that I don't mind pointing out what I don't like in a story. However, I lay no claim to be the final arbitrator of style and taste, you need to decide for yourself what you like or dislike in a book.
Your opinions are always welcome. Comment below.
The Last Kingdom by Bernard Cronwell B-
The Last Kingdom is a story about the youth of Conan the Barbarian, that is to say, Uhtred, son of Uhtred. Rather than a sword and sorcery story, it is a historical novel set in 9th century England when England was being invaded, occupied, and partially subjugated by the Danes, often called the Vikings. That said, Uhtred and Conan seem to have very much in common as fictional characters.
The story is told by Uhtred, son of Uhtred from the vantage point of his old age. It begins when he is 10 years old, the second son of an English nobleman of the north of England. Three Danish ships are spotted and his father, Uhtred, sends his eldest son, Uhtred, son of Uhtred, to spy on them. This sone does something foolish, gets himself killed, so our narrator is given his dead elder brother's name, Uhtred, son of Uhtred, as was custom. His father is then called to raise a force to fight the invading Danes and he takes Uhtred et. al. along, though he's only a boy of 10. They lose that battle. His father is killed. However, Uhtred, seeing the Dane leader who brought his brother's head back to taunt the elder Uhtred, attacks him with his little sword. This amuses the Dane, Ragnar, who then takes him prisoner and raises him much like a son.
Uhtred finds life as a Dane appealing. He wants to be a warrior, and warriors the Danes are. Over the course of the next six years, he becomes a Dane, and a third son to Ragnar, and serves the Danes in their wars against the English, though in his heart he still believes himself an Englishman. And, as the heir of of a noble, he hopes to regain his rightful place in England.
Telling the story from the view point of Uhtred in his old age, allows Cornwell to prove a historical perspective to the events and people the young Uhtred meets in the ten years this book covers, something he could not do if written from the young Uhtred's point of view. And it is very clear that he wants to write a history of these times and uses the eyes and memory of Uhtred to do so. Uhtred's story is a vehicle for telling the history of the time. He is given various adventures that serve to move him about the land so as to view the history and people Cordwell wishes to write about. As such, less attention is paid to him as a character, though Cornwell does try to give him some depth, such as his dual loyalties to this Danish foster-family and his claims to be an English noble, who's land had been usurped by his uncle. Still, his character comes across as somewhat shallow. He's merely a warrior very much in the mold of Conan; a simple barbarian who loves to fight, rape, and murder like the Danes he was raised by.
This is a finely written book that moves along at a nice pace, which earns it is B grade. It has a lot of history to tell of the period when Alfred the Great ruled southern England, and resisted the Danish invaders. Cornwell went on to write 12 more Uhtred novels in this series known variously as the Saxton Chronicles, the Warrior Chronicles, or The Last Kingdom, from the TV series that adopted 10 of the books.
That said, I have no desire to read more of them. Perhaps, if I had seen the TV show, I might have a different opinion. Or not. As I have implied, Uhtred, as a character, is very much a clone of Conan the Barbarian; someone who loves battle and killing his enemies. Other than his love of battle, and scheming, there's not a lot to like about him, for my taste.
There are a number of battle scenes in the book, which, as I have often mentioned, I just skip over, as I can't picture them - making them a waste of my time. Plus, I'm not a fan of old men telling stories of their youth, tossing in hints of what's to come. Which is to say, I'm not a fan of foreshadowing. These negative factors are which earns it its " - " grade. However, I recognize that all of these things I don't like, are things a lot of readers love, so if you are one of them, give this book a try, knowing that if you love it, you have a dozen other books to read with Uhtred. You won't have to leave the 9th century anytime soon.
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