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Most helpful customer reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
3.0 out of 5 stars
Formulaic Fare,
By
This review is from: Azincourt (Paperback)
Bernard Cornwell churns out historical novels as smoothly and effortlessly as a sausage-grinder produces links. Want an easy summer-time read about the Napoleonic Wars? Read his Sharpe series. The American Civil War? The Starbuck Chronicles. Alfred the Great's England? The Lords of the North. Got a hankering for a retelling of the Holy Grail? Cornwell's done that as well as the Arthurian legends. Fancy mysteries set in 18th-century England, or on Caribbean yachts or in the American Revolution? Cornwell's well-oiled story-telling has handled all of those themes.By now his tricks are becoming a little thread-bare as old tropes are repeated. In a Cornwell novel there will always be a dark hero who does not fit into the polite society of his time: too rough and brutish for the gentlemen but devilishly attractive to the ladies. There will always be a wicked priest though Cornwell often balances this character with the addition of a more amiable clergyman who doesn't take his religion very seriously. There is always a maiden to be saved from the clutches of rapists and murderers. Powerful enemies will drive the hero into flight to clear his name or a quest. There will be battles, described with the utmost attention to the gore produced. And so it is with the latest addition to the voluminous Cornwell canon: "Azincourt" based around the 1415 battle of the Hundred Years' War. Readers of Cornwell will recognize RIchard Sharpe or Thomas of Hookton or Uhtred of Bebbanburg in Nicholas Hook, the archer hero of "Azincourt". They will see Obadiah Hakeswill in Sir Martin and Guy Vexille in the Sire de Lanferelle. Cornwell has been here before and it shows. If you want a lengthy description of a medieval battle with little attention wasted on character or plot, this is the book for you.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
Cornwell's Hundred Years' War,
By
This review is from: Azincourt (Hardcover)
Very good retelling of the events leading up to the battle of Azincourt. This was one of the two surprisingly similar great victories won by the English over the French (the other was Crecy in the previous century) during that long and intermittent war. Despite these two battles, the English lost most of their French territories soon after Azincourt, when firearms made both knightly armour and longbows obsolete.Bernard Cornwell produces another of his polished stories. Despite the formulaic nature of his work, noted above, it nonetheless remains effective. Yes, some of the characters are stock. Yes, hunger, wounds, and disease are the same in the fifteenth century as the nineteenth, and are the main enemies of the soldier. Yes, soldiers are soldiers in every century. But these are truths, and don't diminish Cornwell's ability to tell a gripping story. Perfect reading on a plane, at the cottage, or at the doctor's office.
4.0 out of 5 stars
So why do the French hate the English?,
This review is from: Azincourt (Paperback)
The English laid waste to French soil and people for 100 years around the period covered by this book. It influences Anglo/French relations to the present day. B.C. has given us a snapshot of these treacherous times in his engaging hitorical fiction novel. Its one of those compelling yarns where you come out feeling like you know a bit more than you went in with. I love that feeling.Shakespeare fans will enjoy a very light read which adds more actual history to the story of King Harry and the battle of Agincourt.
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