The Flame Bearer

The tenth installment of Bernard Cornwell’s New York Times bestselling series chronicling the epic saga of the making of England, like Game of Thrones, but real (The Observer, London)–the basis for The Last Kingdom, the hit television series.

Britain is in a state of uneasy peace. Northumbria’s Viking ruler, Sigtryggr, and Mercia’s Saxon Queen Aethelflaed have agreed a truce. And so England’s greatest warrior, Uhtred of Bebbanburg, at last has the chance to take back the home his traitorous uncle stole from him so many years ago–and which his scheming cousin still occupies.

But fate is inexorable, and the enemies Uhtred has made and the oaths he has sworn conspire to distract him from his dream of recapturing his home. New enemies enter into the fight for England’s kingdoms: the redoubtable Constantin of Scotland seizes an opportunity for conquest and leads his armies south. Britain’s precarious peace threatens to turn into a war of annihilation. Yet Uhtred is determined that nothing–neither the new adversaries nor the old foes who combine against him–will keep him from his birthright.

Historical novels stand or fall on detail, and Mr. Cornwell writes as if he has been to ninth-century Wessex and back.
–Wall Street Journal