The ending of this one, which seems to work to set up the series as a whole more than anything, certainly points to that. The group is led by “Loveday” FitzTalbot, a grizzled and increasingly disillusioned veteran of many previous campaigns, and includes among its number a shy 16-year-old archer named Romford. We don’t share your credit card details with third-party sellers, and we don’t sell your information to others.

If I had wanted good sport, thought Loveday, I would have stayed home in Essex, playing dice in the inn near Colchester and paying a penny to lay my head of a night between the thighs of Gilda, the alewife's girl. Either the author got bored/ ran out of steam or as I suspect an over zealous editor butchered the original manuscript.I did think that he portrayed violence very well and that’s about the only positive thing I have to say.

At the start, they land on the beaches at Normandy - which will be echoed several hundred years later by a different group determined not so much there to seize France, but free it. The narrative is well written and you can almost hear the clash of swords, the screams of horses and the groans of dying men as the two armies clash. The writing and storyline are top notch and the language used is authentic to the times; which is not always the case with some historical fiction.

This book starts out brilliantly following a small group of ten soldiers (Englishmen, Scotsmen, Welsh folk and others), the Essex Dogs, as they arrive on the shores of Normandy in 1346 to storm the beaches and take France for King Edward III. There is a real lack of tension and conflict in the book which is surprising given its real world inspiration. Unfortunately, they are a consistent feature in the dialogue and quickly lose any of their initial punch.

I had no idea until reading this book how incredibly important English archers – the longbowmen – were to early medieval armies. These cookies help provide information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc. At the same time, he tried to read the waves breaking ahead, that he might sense when the water would be shallow enough for them to leap overboard, and drag the pinnace up the sands. The story does illicit a certain window of the personalities and idea's of the time, but nevertheless still comes up a little short. I wasn’t too sure on his powder addiction however I also believe the author knows his stuff so I went along with it.

The Essex Dogs get a front row seat in the expedition and eventually find themselves involved with the military leaders around Edward. In amongst this are the Essex Dogs and though they fight on the English their first allegiance is to each other.

Dan Jones has ventured into historical fiction with this book, blending real historical events and figures with fictional elements to create an engaging narrative. It offered me a unique blend of entertainment and education, and may do the same to you as well, as long as there is an understanding that certain elements are fictionalized for the sake of the narrative. When Loveday had asked what Sir Robert - and the great lords and the king above him - knew as to how many Frenchmen might be minding the beach, with crossbows cocked and lances couched and their bollocks unsevered and hoping to keep them so, Sir Robert had waved airily at him and told him there would be plenty enough to make good sport. My thanks to NetGalley and, as ever, Head of Zeus for granting this e-ARC in exchange for an honest review. We start with the landing on the Normandy beach, heading ever deeper into enemy territory toward Crécy and trying to survive.

Their job in Normandy is to first find the enemy—not always easy considering "the ingenious French tactic of fleeing at the first sight of trouble"—and then rout them. As they trudge through wind and rain, I was reminded of the scenes in Kenneth Branagh’s film of Henry V in which he leads his bedraggled army. I thought this might be a Richard Sharpe and the Rifles in the 100 years war type of story based on that comparison. The atmosphere of the novel, set mostly on this wild Greek island, echoes strongly the classical tragedies of Greece. From the off, it's clear that we're in for a breathtaking, violently graphic encounter between the medieval armies of England led by Edward III (as well as the young Black Prince) and France.