The Lords of the North
The Lords of the NorthBernard Cornwell

The Lords of the North (2006)

Bernard Cornwell

Creators: Loved

Book 3 of the series. After having fulfilled his oath to Alfred by defeating Guthrum and his army at the Battle of Ethandun and thus giving Alfred his kingdom back, Uthred goes back to Northumbria both to settle his score with Kjartan (now known as Kjartan The Cruel) and his son Sven The One-Eyed, and to fulfill his promise to Ragnar The Younger of avenging the death of their family. Ragnar (and Brida), after having fought with Guthrum and lost, are now Alfred’s prisoners in Winchester. But fate decreed that Uthred go first to Cumbraland where he meets Guthred, the slave meant to become the king of Northumbria. Uthred frees him and becomes his friend and man. However, Guthred betrays Uthred and sells him as a slave in exchange for 200 swords from Bebbanburg. Ragnar learns of Uthred’s fate and sets out to look for him on Alfred’s behest.

ISBN:
9780061801891
Length:
366 pages

Genres: historical fiction

Lists: …

Reviews1

Similar books

Bernard CornwellUhtred is a Saxon, cheated of his inheritance and adrift in a world of fire, sword, and treachery. He has to make a choice: whether to fight for the Vikings, who raised him, or for King Alfred the Great of Wessex, who dislikes him.In the late ninth century, Wessex is the last English kingdom. The rest have fallen to the Danish Vikings, a story told in The Last Kingdom, the New York Times bestselling novel in which Uhtred's tale began. Now the Vikings want to finish England. They assemble the Great Army, whose one ambition is to conquer Wessex. A dispossessed young nobleman, married to a woman who hails from Wessex, Uhtred has little love for either, though for King Alfred he has none at all. Yet fate, as Uhtred learns, has its own imperatives, and when the Vikings attack out of a wintry darkness to shatter the last English kingdom, Uhtred finds himself at Alfred's side.Bernard Cornwell's The Pale Horseman, like The Last Kingdom, is rooted in the real history of Anglo-Saxon England. It tells the astonishing and true story of how Alfred, forced to become a fugitive in a few square miles of swampland, fights his enemies against overwhelming odds. The king is a pious Christian, while Uhtred is a pagan. Alfred is a sickly scholar, while Uhtred is an arrogant warrior. Yet the two forge an uneasy alliance that will lead them out of the marshes to the stark hilltop where the last remaining Saxon army will fight for the very existence of England.Enthralling as both a historical and personal story, The Pale Horseman is a novel of divided loyalties and desperate heroism, featuring a cast of fully realized characters, from a king in despair to a beguiling British sorceress. And always, beyond the spearmen and the swordsmen are the folk who suffer as the tides of war sweep over their farmlands. From Bernard Cornwell, the New York Times bestselling author whom the Washington Post calls "perhaps the greatest writer of historical adventure novels today," The Pale Horseman is yet another masterpiece of historical and battle fiction that gives life to one of the most important and exciting epochs in the history of the English people and culture.

Why?

What made the match, strongest first

  • Loved by creators12 reviews
  • Also historical fiction73%
  • Similar descriptions15%
  • The Brothers Gwynne loved both12%