Hereward a time many fear is the End of Days With the English King Edward heirless and ailing across the grey seas in Normandy the brutal William the Bastard waits for the moment when he can drown Engla
1062, a time many fear is the End of Days With the English King Edward heirless and ailing, across the grey seas in Normandy the brutal William the Bastard waits for the moment when he can drown England in a tide of blood.The ravens of war are gathering But as the king s closest advisors scheme and squabble amongst themselves, hopes of resisting the naked ambition of the1062, a time many fear is the End of Days With the English King Edward heirless and ailing, across the grey seas in Normandy the brutal William the Bastard waits for the moment when he can drown England in a tide of blood.The ravens of war are gathering But as the king s closest advisors scheme and squabble amongst themselves, hopes of resisting the naked ambition of the Norman duke come to rest with just one man Hereward.To some a ruthless warrior and master tactician, to others a devil in human form, Hereward is as adept in the art of slaughter as the foes that gather to claim England s throne But in his country s hour of greatest need, his enemies at Court have made him outlaw To stay alive and a freeman he must carve a bloody swathe from the frozen hills of Northumbria to Flanders fields and the fenlands of East Anglia.The tale of a man whose deeds will become the stuff of legend, this is also the story of two mismatched allies Hereward the man of war, and Alric, a man of peace, a monk One will risk everything to save the land he loves, the other to save his friend s soul.James Wilde s thrilling, action packed debut rescues a great English hero from the darkest of times and brings him to brutal and bloody life.
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Hereward >> James Wilde
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James Wilde
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Title:
Hereward >> James Wilde
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Published :2019-09-09T21:07:22+00:00
James Wilde is a Man of Mercia Raised in a world of books, the author studied economic history at university before travelling the world in search of adventure Unable to forget a childhood encounter in the pages of a comic with the great English warrior, Hereward, Wilde returned to the haunted fenlands of Eastern England, Hereward s ancestral home, where he became convinced that this legendary hero should be the subject of his first novel Wilde now indulges his love of history and the high life in the home his family have owned for several generations in the heart of a Mercian forest.
232 Replys to “Hereward”
Didn’t quite pan out as I expected I read the date involved & thought excellent a story about a Saxon Huscarl who goes against them Normans at the Battle of Hastings What we get though is a different recount of the “good guys” and the “bad guys” amongst the Saxon court & Thegns as Harold Godwinson is portrayed as very different to how my history was taught to me, his brother Tostig too had a different character than I recognised through my history lessons. It’s an interesting [...]
This is a fictionalized account of Hereward the Wake, dubbed the last Englishman and one of the local leaders who openly resisted the Norman invasion of England in the 11th century. Normally this time period is a page-turner for me, but maybe it was just unfortunate that I read this book when I was sick with the flu and my mind wasn’t on a full-on reading mood these past weeks. It also didn’t help to find Hereward’s character a little angsty and too self-absorbed for a legendary hero, and [...]
Superb. Nothing less.Hereward gripped me and held me at sword-point from page one.(That was my attempt at writing something they might want to use on a future Hereward book jacket).I can't remember being so impressed by a historical novel for a long, long time. It really is that good.Set in an interesting and - for me, at least - under discovered period; the years just before and just after the Norman invasion of 1066. We're in the death-throws of the Viking period, the old, 'real' England is st [...]
Okay. I finished it, but this book did not blow me away.Here's the plot of the story: Two wrongly accused men, one moral and one amoral, develop a friendship as they attempt to clear their names during the period leading up to (and immediately following) the Norman Invasion.It took my 150 page to realize what this book was about. Until that point, the book was a series of violent escapes during which violent men try to violently murder other violent men. Hereward violently violences the violent [...]
Based on the character of Hereward the Wake and largely following the line of the Gesta Herewardi, I enjoyed the book pretty much, until I came to the part where Hereward goes to Flanders. Wilde got the description of the landscape and the coast of Northern France, Flanders, the Zealand Isles,.(especially Walcheren where I used to live) and the Dutch Coast and Scaldis estuary all wrong. There are no pebble beaches, and Walcheren - (quote) Hereward studied Walcheren. It looked like an upturned bo [...]
I would initially be a little hesitant to freely give a book five stars but this is the first book I've read in a long time that hooked me right from the start.I know it's probably because I'm a big fan of Bernard Cornwell, especially the saga centred on Uhtred Of Bebbanburg, but there are echoes of such great storytelling here. Hereward, told more in the third person, is a more visceral, bloodthirsty and angry story than that of Uhtred with a lot of the same high quality plot weaving, engrossin [...]
Obviously the first in a planned series of novels on Hereward 'the Wake' (in this context, 'the Wake' means wary or watchful), who was a real Saxon who lead the resistance against the Norman invaders of England in William the Conquerors time.While largely forgotten by history, many of Herewards exploits have later been subsumed into the many legends of Robin Hood - it is easy to see the parallels between the two characters and, as such, I thought that this could prove to be an interesting read.U [...]
This book was a bit of a dissapointment to me as I was attracted by the cover which had an awesome character on the front, Hereward, handsomely mad, monstrously rugged and deadly. You could see the devil in his eyes as he drew back the arrow from a bow that he was never portrayed as having fired in the book (as far as I remember). Anyway, the character turned out to be just a tad to inhuman at times (sinking his teeth into a wolf's throat and fighting a bear) and at other times a little too emot [...]
I almost gave up reading this novel of Hereward, the English leader of the resistance to William the Conqueror, since the first part was so confusing. After he meets the monk and they travel together, I wondered what each of them had done to deserve outlawry; also what the plot and the conspiracy were. Nothing made sense but all fell together finally and I'm glad I did persist and finish. The novel tells of Hereward's wanderings as outlaw, fleeing to Flanders and his adventures there, then retur [...]
It's all grr arg stab kill. Hereward is like a more violent Robin Hood without the merry men, but he has almost got a friar Tuck. Not a bad tale but I won't be rushing straight into the next one.
Hereward was something of an unknown for me as I went into it. With most historical fiction I read, I have some grounding in the subject or characters, but my knowledge of Hereward the Wake is limited to the fact that I knew the name, though I couldn’t even have placed him in a century until I read this book. So there’s something important that James Wilde has done: he has put a hitherto vague name on the map for a lot of people as a historical hero and placed him in a time period.The book h [...]
There have been a fair few novels set around this period of history lately, some have met mixed reviews. It really depends on what you are looking for from a historical fiction book?EG: Conquest by Stewart Binns is a rousing tale that roars along with loads of blood and thunder action and has a heavy tilt towards nationality. While Shieldwall by Justin Hill is a slower more historically rich title that really educates the reader.Hereward for me falls somewhere in-between, it has a fair bit of hi [...]
This is defintely one of several Hereward based historical novels I'd recommend. It has a movie style epic and gripping start and the characters are so rich in detail and depth and the plots so intricately woven together that even Shakespeare's plots seemed simple compared to the ones in this book.It truly takes the reader into the reality of the anglo-saxon world complete with characters from simple peasant folk through monks and priests, warriors and hurscals, noble ladies and the cut-throat ( [...]
'Drink,' he said. 'Let the juices of the toadstool fill you with the passion of our ancestors.' He passed the vessel of steaming urine to IvarSo much for budget caterersThe above quote wasn't from the mouth of Hereward, but one of the many unsavoury adversaries he encounters throughout the book, most of whom swiftly get the chop. The action starts early with Hereward rising Rambo-like out of a pool of bloody water to dispatch a bunch of Viking mercenaries and, after skinning one of them, slaught [...]
For a book where so many passing characters get brutally hacked about by axes, it was kind of dull! It had sat on my bedside reading pile for about a year, and when I finally picked it up, it took me about twice as long as I'd have expected to read. All but the last 50 pages seems like a prequel to the real story, which I assume starts in book 2 of the series, but given I've just discovered there are 5 books, the pacing of this one could suggest that book 2 is still the prequel too. I don't feel [...]
Even though I read this first book of the trilogy after the second by mistake, that didn't detract too much from my enjoyment of it. Comparisons have been made to Cornwell's Uhtred and many are valid but I find Hereward and his cohorts much more grittier. As in subsequent books of this series, there is blood and gore aplenty and Wilde's descriptions of the cruelty perpetrated by both the English and Normans are cringeworthy. That said, I suspect this series is a fairly accurate representation of [...]
From England to Flaunders and back to England, from England before William the Conqueror to after the invasion, from outlawed madman to legendary hero. What a trip James Wilde has taken me on through the legendary Hereward. This is a story that will never leave you waiting or bored ACTION packed (a little gory at times) but action packed from beginning to end. I was totally enthralled from the beginning, highly recommend this book to anyone who likes historical fiction or just a little action ad [...]
An exciting read. I liked the detail in this, the fens, the dirt and cold, the people, the fighting, I could picture everything very clearly. The 3 and half rather than 4 stars is just because it didn't feel much different to the other historical ones I'd read, only in that it dealt with a different character. But that's an issue of the genre more than a comment on the writing. I wouldn't read the next but my husband would! He's much more a fan of this type of story than me.
I picked this book up off the "new" table in the library because it interested me to read about Hereward. There isn't much written about this medieval warrior, but he is an interesting historical figure. I didn't love the book. It was almost good, but never quite reached its potential. It was definitely fast paced with lots of heads being lopped off and blood everywhere, but I felt like there were places where more character development could happen and did not.
3.5 stars. A little more gore than I usually care for but the rest of the story was well written. I appreciated the author's characterizations of Harold and William. It's nice to see an author who doesn't take sides even if his Harold was a little extreme.
Hereward is a local hero around my neck of the woods and I really wanted to like, no, love, this book. However, I abandoned it half way through as the writing is turgid and life is too short for turgid books.
That was tough historical fiction with twists and turns, tons of emotions and blood and sweat and action.I look forward to read THE DEVIL'S ARMY
“History is like an old movie with a degraded print,” says author James Wilde. This is why I enjoy historical fiction. Yet this first novel in Wilde’s Hereward series is horrific. I won't read the sequels. I’d rather read Charles Kingsley's Hereward or relevant nonfiction. For fiction set in any era of medieval England, not just the Norman Conquest, I recommend Ivanhoe and Ishiguro’s The Buried Giant instead. Wilde’s writing is terrible! I liked his attention to detail at first, main [...]
This is a well written page turner and never boring. I was fascinated about the story of Hereward the Wake as far back as when I was at primary school and even then, as young as I was, I knew he was special because he was the only warrior that held out to fight against the Normans. This book satisfies all my childhood fantasies about him and is certainly worth reading if you like adventure involving the minority fighting against subjugation and how one man tried to instigate a rebellion for free [...]
Didn't realise it was a series. No wonder it dragged somewhat. But not a bad book.
Original Post: thefoundingfields/2012/06/.“A wonderful, bloody, gory, page-turning and epic journey that sees James Wilde soar to the top of my list of historical fiction authors that I want to read more of. Unmissable.” ~The Founding FieldsAs you’re well aware, I have been reading a lot of historical fiction lately from a variety of eras, and in the past few weeks I’ve reviewed titles that have been set in Victorian London the Roman Empire. This is my first taste of a novel set around t [...]
1062, a time many fear is the End of Days. With the English King Edward heirless and ailing, across the grey seas in Normandy the brutal William the Bastard waits for the moment when he can drown England in a tide of blood.The ravens of war are gathering. But as the king’s closest advisors scheme and squabble amongst themselves, hopes of resisting the naked ambition of the Norman duke come to rest with just one man: Hereward…To some a ruthless warrior and master tactician, to others a devil [...]
Overall a pretty good and unique story. The ending really got moving and built up to a good continuation, however the middle was a little drawn out and hard to stay in tune with the story.
The year is 1062, and England's king Edward is rapidly approaching his final years. If this wasn't bad enough, he has no agreed upon heir. James Wilde immerses us into the turbulent dark ages of 11th century Europe inThe Time of the Wolf . Our protagonist is Hereward, and other reviewers comparisons to Conan the Barbarian are spot on. The first 200ish pages are full of his mostly indiscriminate, and completely brutal killing techniqueswith a few episodes of torture thrown in for good measure. He [...]
Stunning Historical Fiction using a Hero of EnglandFrom the very first paragraph, Wilde grips you with his powerful writing and keen word selection as he depicts Hereward, an outlawed member of the court of King Edward of England in the year 1022. Edward is old and dying without having appointed an heir. His nobles are doing everything but killing each other to be in line to take the throne. Meanwhile, William the Bastard in Normandy has a legitimate claim to the throne, but he is ruthless and b [...]