The sequel to the epic HERO BORN

Brann has come a long way since his days as a galley slave. At Lord Einarr’s side, he journeys to the capital of the Empire to warn the Emperor about Loku and his depraved cult.

But Loku already has the Emperor in his thrall, and his scheming ensures that Brann is enslaved once more. He is put to work in the fighting pits deep below the city, where a man might escape with his life, but not his soul.

Brann emerges bent on revenge, determined to stop Loku. But first he must fight to recover the man that he once was, to become the hero he is meant to be.

It’s in the darkest hour, when all hope is lost, that heroes are born.

After witnessing the deaths of everyone he holds dear, Brann is wrenched from his family home and thrust into a life of slavery. Now he must do everything he can to survive.

Miles away, word is spreading of a growing evil; a deposed and forgotten Emperor is seeking a weapon to use in his bid to rise once again to power. Ruthless and determined, nothing and no one can stand in his way. Especially not a galley slave like Brann.

But heroes can be forged in the most unlikely of ways, and Brann’s journey has only just begun.

In this extraordinary novel, Karen Maitland delivers a dazzling reinterpretation of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales—an ingenious alchemy of history, mystery, and powerful human drama.

The year is 1348. The Black Plague grips the country. In a world ruled by faith and fear, nine desperate strangers, brought together by chance, attempt to outrun the certain death that is running inexorably toward them.

Each member of this motley company has a story to tell. From Camelot, the relic-seller who will become the group’s leader, to Cygnus, the one-armed storyteller . . . from the strange, silent child called Narigorm to a painter and his pregnant wife, each has a secret. None is what they seem. And one among them conceals the darkest secret of all—propelling these liars to a destiny they never saw coming.

Magical, heart-quickening, and raw, Company of Liars is a work of vaulting imagination from a powerful new voice in historical fiction.


From the Hardcover edition.

Darkness falls on the Great Green, and the Ancient World is fiercely divided.

On the killing fields outside the golden city of Troy, forces loyal to the Mykene King mass. Among them is Odysseus, fabled storyteller and reluctant ally to the Mykene, who knows that he must soon face his former friends in deadly combat.

Within the city, the Trojan king waits. Ailing and bitter, his hope is pinned on two heroes: his favourite son Hektor, and the dread Helikaon who will wreak terrible vengeance for the death of his wife at Mykene hands.

War has been declared — a war filled with bloodlust, and peopled by heroes who will live forever in a story that will echo down the centuries.


From the Paperback edition.

In a spellbinding novel of gods and men, myth and brutality, acclaimed author Manda Scott returns to her heralded saga of a world under siege. For here is the epic tale of Boudica, the legendary Celtic queen, and her embattled Eceni tribe—a bold new work of imaginative fiction that takes us on a thrilling journey into a clash between magic and mankind.

To the Eceni tribe of Britannia, nature is the ultimate god, and warriors are joined in battle by the voices and spirits of their ancestors. But the proud Eceni are running out of time. Nero’s army, long since out of patience with Britannia’s wild tribes, is becoming increasingly oppressive. And Boudica’s family is at the center of a gathering storm: Cunomar, Boudica’s son, who longs for the mettle to kill as fiercely as his mother… Graine, her young daughter, gifted with the power of dreamers, scarred forever by the horrors of war...and Boudica’s brother, born Bán of the Eceni, turned the traitor Valerius—a man caught between worlds: warrior and dreamer, Roman and Eceni.

As conflict erupts between the tribes and their brutal invaders, Boudica is forced to make a bold sacrifice. Cloaking her identity, she will travel directly into the stronghold of an enemy who longs for her crucifixion. What happens next—in a brutal drama of betrayal, heroism, and sacrifice—will leave Boudica with no options but one: to raise and arm every warrior, every dreamer, every tribe…and push the invader and its legions back into the sea.

From the thundering hooves of the Eceni’s great horses to mystical spirit quests of young warriors, from the politics of an empire to the passions of lovers, Dreaming the Hound takes us on a breathtaking journey of the imagination—at once brutal, fantastical, and utterly unforgettable.


MAGNIFICENT PRAISE FOR MANDA SCOTT’S BOUDICA SAGA

Dreaming the Hound

“Extraordinary.” —Independent, UK

“Brilliantly imaginative.”—Colchester Evening Gazette, UK

“Dramatic…Vivid…Lyrical.”—Yorkshire Evening Post, UK

“One of Britain’s most famous legends…is retold here with extraordinary immediacy.”—Our Time, UK

“Irresistible…an excellent read.”—Diva, UK

Dreaming the Bull

“Enthralling…Mesmerising…Creates a living past of battle feats, betrayals, heart-breaking loyalties and cruelties.”—Publishing News, UK

“Thrilling…Readers will be swept away.” —Booklist, starred review

Dreaming the Eagle

“A powerful novel about one of the most intriguing and mysterious women in history…Alive with the love, deceit, wisdom and heroics of humanity. Read it and enjoy!”—Jean M. Auel

“The new Mary Renault…Intensely exciting, a tale of passion, courage and heroism against huge odds.”—Publishing News, UK


From the Hardcover edition.

The second novel in David Gemmell’s bestselling Troy trilogy. Interlacing myth and history, and high adventure, this is epic storytelling at its very best.

War is looming, and all the kings of the Great Green are gathering, each with their own dark plans of conquest and plunder.

Into this maelstrom of treachery come three travellers: Piria, a runaway priestess nursing a terrible secret; Kalliades, a warrior with high ideals and a legendary sword; and his close friend Banokles, who will carve his own legend in the battles to come.

Together they journey to the fabled city of Troy, where a darkness is falling that will eclipse the triumphs and personal tragedies of ordinary mortals for centuries to come.


From the Paperback edition.

The second part of the stunning fictionalization of the life of Britain’s warrior queen, Boudica, immerses us in a world of druids and dreamers, warriors and lovers, passion and courage. Originally a trilogy, this is now a four-part series.

“Boudica” means “Bringer of Victory” (from the early Celtic word “boudeg”). She was the last defender of the Celtic culture; the only woman openly to lead her warriors into battle and to stand successfully against the might of Imperial Rome -- and triumph.

Book one, Dreaming the Eagle, took readers from Boudica’s girlhood with the Eceni tribe to the climax of the two-day battle when she and her lover, Caradoc, faced the invading Romans. Believing her dead, Breaca’s beloved brother, Bán, joined the Roman cause.

Dreaming the Bull, the second book in this compelling series, continues the intertwined stories of Boudica, and Bán, now an officer in the Roman cavalry. They stand on opposite sides in a brutal war of attrition between the occupying army and the defeated tribes, each determined to see the other dead. In a country under occupation, Caradoc, lover to Breaca, is caught and faces the ultimate penalty. Only Bán has the power to save him, and Bán has spent the past ten years denying his past. Treachery divides these two; heroism brings them together again, changed out of all recognition -- but it may not be enough to heal the wounds.

Dreaming the Bull is a heart-stopping story of war and of peace; of love, passion and betrayal; of druids and warring gods, where each life is sacred and each death even more so; and where Breaca and Bán learn the terrible distances they must travel to fulfill their own destinies.


Through the summer, Cunomar came to recognize two different kinds of warriors. The smaller group consisted of those few men and women still alive who had known his mother before the two-day battle against the invading legions. These were her friends and they called her Breaca in the way Cunomar’s father and the innermost circle of the honour guard still did. The rest, who had met her only in battle or, worse, knew her only by reputation, gave the warrior’s salute in a way that was subtly different and hailed her as the Boudica, bringer of victory. She didn’t enjoy that, but in the short span of his life, Cunomar had watched his mother become more comfortable with name, so that it settled on her like a worn cloak and she did not stiffen at the sound of it.

He had heard her use the word herself for the first time that morning as a cold dawn sharpened the air and Nemain, the moon, lowered into her bed in the mountains. Breaca had stood on the back of her mare and addressed the massed ranks of warriors and dreamers, naming them all Boudegae, bringers of victory, and swearing before them that she would fight for as long as it took to rid the land of the invader. -- from Dreaming the Bull


From the Trade Paperback edition.

Dreaming the Eagle is the first part of the gloriously imagined epic trilogy of the life of Boudica.

Boudica means Bringer of Victory (from the early Celtic word “boudeg”). She is the last defender of the Celtic culture in Britain; the only woman openly to lead her warriors into battle and to stand successfully against the might of Imperial Rome -- and triumph.

It is 33 AD and eleven-year-old Breaca (later named Boudica), the red-haired daughter of one of the leaders of the Eceni tribe, is on the cusp between girl and womanhood. She longs to be a Dreamer, a mystical leader who can foretell the future, but having killed the man who has attacked and killed her mother, she has proven herself a warrior. Dreaming the Eagle is also the story of the two men Boudica loves most: Caradoc, outstanding warrior and inspirational leader; and Bàn, her half-brother, who longs to be a warrior, though he is manifestly a Dreamer, possibly the finest in his tribe’s history. Bàn becomes the Druid whose eventual return to the Celts is Boudica’s salvation.

Dreaming the Eagle is full of brilliantly realised, luminous scenes as the narrative sweeps effortlessly from the epic -- where battle scenes are huge, bloody, and action-packed -- to the intimate. Manda Scott plunges us into the unforgettable world of tribal Britain in the years before the Roman invasion: a world of druids and dreamers and the magic of the gods where the natural world is as much a character as any of the people who live within it, a world of warriors who fight for honour as much as victory, a world of passion, courage and spectacular heroism pitched against overwhelming odds.

Dreaming the Eagle stunningly recreates the roots of a story so powerful its impact has lasted through the ages.


From the Trade Paperback edition.

July 2005. In the Pyrenees mountains near Carcassonne, Alice, a volunteer at an archaeological dig, stumbles into a cave and makes a startling discovery-two crumbling skeletons, strange writings on the walls, and the pattern of a labyrinth.

Eight hundred years earlier, on the eve of a brutal crusade that will rip apart southern France, a young woman named Alais is given a ring and a mysterious book for safekeeping by her father. The book, he says, contains the secret of the true Grail, and the ring, inscribed with a labyrinth, will identify a guardian of the Grail. Now, as crusading armies gather outside the city walls of Carcassonne, it will take a tremendous sacrifice to keep the secret of the labyrinth safe.

Lucy Derrick is a young woman of good breeding and poor finances. After the death of her beloved father, she becomes the unwanted boarder of her tyrannical uncle, fending off marriage to a local mill owner. But just as she is resigned to a life of misery, a handsome stranger—the poet and notorious rake Lord Byron—arrives at her house, stricken by what seems to be a curse, and with a cryptic message for Lucy.
 
With England on the cusp of revolution, Lucy inexplicably finds herself awakened to a world where magic and mortals collide, and the forces of ancient nature and modern progress are at war for the soul of England . . . and the world. The key to victory may be connected to a cryptic volume whose powers of enchantment are unbounded. Now, challenged by ruthless enemies with ancient powers at their command, Lucy must harness newfound mystical skills to preserve humanity’s future. And enthralled by two exceptional men with designs on her heart, she must master her own desires to claim the destiny she deserves.
 
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The sequel to the epic HERO BORN

Brann has come a long way since his days as a galley slave. At Lord Einarr’s side, he journeys to the capital of the Empire to warn the Emperor about Loku and his depraved cult.

But Loku already has the Emperor in his thrall, and his scheming ensures that Brann is enslaved once more. He is put to work in the fighting pits deep below the city, where a man might escape with his life, but not his soul.

Brann emerges bent on revenge, determined to stop Loku. But first he must fight to recover the man that he once was, to become the hero he is meant to be.

It’s in the darkest hour, when all hope is lost, that heroes are born.

After witnessing the deaths of everyone he holds dear, Brann is wrenched from his family home and thrust into a life of slavery. Now he must do everything he can to survive.

Miles away, word is spreading of a growing evil; a deposed and forgotten Emperor is seeking a weapon to use in his bid to rise once again to power. Ruthless and determined, nothing and no one can stand in his way. Especially not a galley slave like Brann.

But heroes can be forged in the most unlikely of ways, and Brann’s journey has only just begun.