[PR0]⇒ [PDF] Hood King Raven Trilogy Book 1 Steve Lawhead 9781595540850 Books

Hood King Raven Trilogy Book 1 Steve Lawhead 9781595540850 Books

Download As PDF : Hood King Raven Trilogy Book 1 Steve Lawhead 9781595540850 Books

Hood King Raven Trilogy Book 1 Steve Lawhead 9781595540850 Books

The year is 1093. The King of England is William II, aka William the Red, and the Normans are plotting their further control over English territories. And Wales becomes the screwed over battleground. Thus starts our adventures with Bran ap Brychan and his "merrymen."

Hood a tale that re-imagines the lore of Robin Hood not as English but as Welsh. If you're like me, the only thing you know about Robin Hood is from the Looney Toons or Disney's anthropomorphic version, i.e., limited. There's also Errol Flynn and Kevin Costner's interpretation of Robin Hood of which I've never seen. And there's Russell Crowe's Robin Hood which I suppose is forgetful because I recall nothing of it, but I digress.

Going into this with limited knowledge of Robin Hood, I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed this. The character development of our protagonist was great; slow building but by the end of the novel a fist pump is in order, especially be the end of the epilogue. The characterisations of the antagonists are grand as well; you hate them with varying degrees of odiousness. However, as much as I loved the protagonist, Bran, I found myself having more affection towards the supporting characters behind Bran. If one of those characters gets written off, I may or may not become emo-devastated.

By the end of Book One, the tone has been set and the intrigue established leading into Book Two.

With an open mind and open to genres, I don't think you can do wrong with Hood . There's a certain realism with the setting and environments presented to the reader. The fantasy portion seems to be steeped in Albion folklore/fairy tales and not necessarily, "I cast magic missile on your ass." I wouldn't necessarily call this a "must read" book, but something to add to the queue should the genre fit your mood.


Tags : Hood (King Raven Trilogy, Book 1) [Steve Lawhead] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. <P>Robin Hood:The Legend Begins Anew</P><P>For centuries, the legend of Robin Hood and his band of thieves has captivated the imagination. Now the familiar tale takes on new life,Steve Lawhead,Hood (King Raven Trilogy, Book 1),Westbow Pr,1595540857,Historical - General,Great Britain;History;Norman period, 1066-1154;Fiction.,Robin Hood (Legendary character);Fiction.,Wales;History;1063-1284;Fiction.,1063-1284,AMERICAN HISTORICAL FICTION,FICTION Historical General,Fantasy - Historical,Fiction,Fiction - Fantasy,Fiction-Historical,GENERAL,General Adult,History,Monograph Series, any,Normans,Robin Hood (Legendary character),United States,Wales

Hood King Raven Trilogy Book 1 Steve Lawhead 9781595540850 Books Reviews

Mild spoilers within.

First things first, this is not a complete story. This was written to be a trilogy, and there really is no climax, no denouement whatsoever in this book.

That said, is what is here good? Yes, but only good. As a caveat, I have read only this book, so when taken as the "setting the stage" portion of a trilogy, maybe it fares better. But taken as is, it's mere good. It does a good job of setting up the characters - headstrong and rash Bran, fearful but stoic Tuck, strong right hand Iwan. It sets up the villains - duplicitous Neufmarche, somewhat weak and inept de Braose, scheming Abbot Hugo - as well. But it does little more than that, and the rest is a series of long, drawn out sections followed by blink and you miss it passages.

Much time is spent with Bran's long change towards a less selfish demeanor, and then anything resembling conflict is done with a couple of paragraphs of broad-stroke description. Long paragraphs are spent with Marian's inner conflict, and then Bran & Tuck are captured off screen.

All in all, I felt that this did too much telling me what happened, and not enough showing me things happening. I am uncertain if I will finish the trilogy or not.
Will be short as plenty has been stated already. I am not sure whether I like the book or not. This is my first Lawhead book. I will have to say that in places that the plot moves along very slowly. The author's use of alternate spellings such as "Ffreinc, Lundein," I guess, is to immerse the reader within the historical context but ends up being annoying as are old Welsh terms for governmental units. Had to keep my droid handy to check on the meanings of some of these as I was reading along(I had the edition and the dictionary helped occasionally but certainly not always). So far this book did not strike me as blatantly Christian, as many books set in a medieval time period are going to have monks, etc., there, and one of the main "good guys" strikes me very much as a druid or witch.....spoilers follow..............

I am just not sure that I buy completely the mechanism that King Raven used to scare the bad guys, that battle-hardened knights would just cower that easily; just a guy in a black feathered hood, some tricky lighting/shadowing, and some well-orchestrated fires and psychological warfare. And his transformation from Bran into the legendary monster of the forest just sort of happened after this long recuperation period(which was as painful for me as it was for the character) under the care of an old crone witch/alchemist character. After the descriptions of the huts that his people lived in (in the secret hideout) and of some of the decorations they used, I wondered where I had seen this before, and it struck me that it reminded me of the depiction of the Forsworn in the game Skyrim, with their furs and animal skulls, as is the scenario whereby they were forced out of their cities into the woodlands and hills by the invading Nords...
The antagonist, bad-guy characters don't seem to me to have much complexity.....they are just mostly evil, most of the time conquer, pillage, enslave, rinse and repeat. They hate each other about as much as they do the Welsh, constantly jockeying/competing for an advantage over the others. Bran's character is interesting in that he does usually have good motives and that he is also portrayed as having significant character flaws(significantly more than the usual Robin Hood depictions that I am used to) and is plagued by doubts at various times. There are some interesting characters like Tuck that I did enjoy reading about.
A new telling of the Robin Hood story. This time the setting is in Wales during the late 11th century. Bran ap Brychan is the headstrong and selfish son of a king who is killed by Norman invaders. They seize the cantref of Elfael and enslave its people to build castles. Bran is hunted and left for dead. He is rescued by a mysterious old women who is more than a healer of his physical wounds. She helps Bran to discover his true purpose in life in defending his people and recovering his homeland. The first of three books, this is a well-written, thrilling adventure to read.
The year is 1093. The King of England is William II, aka William the Red, and the Normans are plotting their further control over English territories. And Wales becomes the screwed over battleground. Thus starts our adventures with Bran ap Brychan and his "merrymen."

Hood a tale that re-imagines the lore of Robin Hood not as English but as Welsh. If you're like me, the only thing you know about Robin Hood is from the Looney Toons or Disney's anthropomorphic version, i.e., limited. There's also Errol Flynn and Kevin Costner's interpretation of Robin Hood of which I've never seen. And there's Russell Crowe's Robin Hood which I suppose is forgetful because I recall nothing of it, but I digress.

Going into this with limited knowledge of Robin Hood, I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed this. The character development of our protagonist was great; slow building but by the end of the novel a fist pump is in order, especially be the end of the epilogue. The characterisations of the antagonists are grand as well; you hate them with varying degrees of odiousness. However, as much as I loved the protagonist, Bran, I found myself having more affection towards the supporting characters behind Bran. If one of those characters gets written off, I may or may not become emo-devastated.

By the end of Book One, the tone has been set and the intrigue established leading into Book Two.

With an open mind and open to genres, I don't think you can do wrong with Hood . There's a certain realism with the setting and environments presented to the reader. The fantasy portion seems to be steeped in Albion folklore/fairy tales and not necessarily, "I cast magic missile on your ass." I wouldn't necessarily call this a "must read" book, but something to add to the queue should the genre fit your mood.