Showing results by author "Griff Hosker" in All Categories

The incredible story of how a handful of men at arms and less than 5,000 archers defeated more than 20,000 men at arms and 20,000 other warriors. The story of how a king won a crown! The last time an English king had come to France, it had been led by the Black Prince. Now a new king, a throwback to those days, contemplated retaking what he believed to be his birthright!

When Jarl Gunnar Thorfinnson is killed by Saxons and his wife and son slain it throws the clan on Raven Wing Island into disarray. Internal divisions and strife is only stopped when Siggi White Hair becomes jarl. A raid on Frankia gives Hrolf the Horseman a vision of his dream of a new home. When treachery strikes and the Bretons attack it seems that all of his dreams will be destroyed before he can make them a reality.

The last Viking left in the New World finds fresh challenges when his growing family is forced to leave their home on the Patawomke River to sail north and find a new home amongst tribes who may be hostile. As his clan grows, Erik learns to adapt to this new world and all its wonders.

Sámr Ship Killer has been rescued, but that is only half the story, for his family has been taken as hostages to Norway. Without any ships, he is helpless to find them, and then the sisters begin to spin. Erik Black Toe, who carried the standard for the Dragonheart, returns with news. The family is found, but in dire straits and cruelly treated by Uddulfr the Sly. The Clan of the Fox comes to the aid of the Wolf once more, and Fótr, along with Ebbe and Bear Tooth, sail ‘Gytha’ across the seas to Norway.

The Vikings on the Island of Man are set on revenge. Their families have been kidnapped and taken to Ireland. They have to find them and rescue them. They find themselves fighting not only Hibernian warriors but renegade Vikings, too. The perpetrator of the act, Tadgh, escapes and a chase ensues.

This story is set at the end of the 10th century and charts the journey of a young warrior, whose father, Bersi, is killed during a raid on Wessex. Sven Bersisson has to grow up quickly and to follow in his father’s footsteps. Sweyn Skull Taker, his uncle, becomes his foster father and they raid Wessex and Frankia, where the young warrior becomes a man. King Sweyn Forkbeard, the king of Denmark, uses their clan to help in his dream of defeating the Norwegians and then taking the throne of England.

This first instalment in the Chronicles tells of Rodrigo’s rise to prominence when he became the champion of Prince Sancho of Castile. This is but the beginning of a tale which still stirs the blood a millennium after it began. The legend that was El Cid began more than 1,000 years ago, and time has meant that reality and fiction are intertwined like the threads of a spider’s web.

Erik and his family are Norse who live on the island of Orkneyjar. Their world is thrown upside down when the King of Norway colludes with their jarl to take over their home. They flee to the land north of Mercia. Hoping for a life free from the tyranny of a King, they have to fight Danes and Saxons. When King Harald of Norway sends ships to destroy them, the Clan of the Fox is forced to flee to the newly discovered land of ice and fire. They travel beyond sight of land into an uncharted ocean to face a future which is uncertain.

Alfraed of Norton is given the task of protecting the Empress Matilda back to the emperor, her husband. He and his men have to fight enemies, bandits and treachery from within as they battle thorough an empire that is a nest of treachery and political ambition. While princes play for thrones, Alfraed must keep the empress safe.

Henry of Monmouth, Prince Hal, is barely recovered from a near-fatal wound when his father leaves him to retake his land. Owain Glendower and Edmund Mortimer, however, have French allies and the most inhospitable landscape to aid them. All that Prince Hal has to guide him is the guardian of kings, Will Strongstaff. The two of them have to fight treachery and those who count money as well as more traditional enemies, the Welsh archers.

The Empress has given England a male heir but that single action creates rebels in Scotland and in Normandy who try to wrest Normandy and England from King Henry. When the Earl of Cleveland becomes his champion, it unleashes a storm of murder and treachery at the very heart of the Earl's world. In a fast-moving novel with battles and combats from the borders of Scotland to France itself, we see a world heading towards anarchy and civil war.

Set in the years before the Battle of Hastings, the story follows the trials and tribulations of Aelfraed, a young boy who aspires to be a warrior. When his uncle, Aethelward, takes him to join the warriors of Harold Godwinson, his life is irrevocably changed. Fighting the Welsh brings him great honour and when he saves the life of Edward the Confessor, he becomes a man of great reputation. The novel culminates in the battle of Stamford Bridge when the Housecarls defeated the last of the Vikings, Harald Hadrada.

Jarl Dragon Heart leaves the Isle of Man to go raiding. Beset by enemies both Viking and Saxon, he has to rely on the Ulfheonar and his own skills to see him through the crisis. A harsh winter in the land of Rheged brings him face-to-face with his old enemy, the Wolf. All the while, he is learning about his own ancestor, the Warlord of Rheged. The treachery of other Vikings who try to carve out kingdoms has Dragon Heart caught in the middle of their machinations.

The battle for France is almost over but the Plantagenets do not know it. They cling to the hope that by throwing more and more men at a lost cause, they will regain the land lost. Sir Michael of Weedon knows that is not true and is tired of the waste. He has fulfilled his promise to a dead king, as well as his mentor, but it is a savage attack on his new family's home that makes him return to England. It is there that Fate catches up with him. He is summoned by Queen Catherine, King Henry's widow, and she entrusts him with her most valuable treasure and makes him, the Queen's Knight.

The story of a young illegitimate son of a Norman noble and the daughter of an English housecarl. Forced to be little more than a servant Robert fitz Malet shows the world and his half brothers that he has qualities which mark him as different. When he meets the famous troubadour, Taillefer, he becomes one of the most skilled swordsmen in Duke William's army as they prepare to invade England and claim the crown promised to him by King Edward.

Will Strongstaff has achieved far more than he ever thought. He is a gentleman. He has land, a wife and children. Yet he is still a warrior. He still has an oath to honour. King Richard is now under the sway of the evil Earl of Oxford Robert de Vere. When the king’s cousin, Henry Bolingbroke, sends for Will to fight in Galicia for his father, John of Gaunt, then Will has to return to the world in which he grew up, the world of the hired sword. This time he not only has enemies on the battlefield but enemies closer to hand as murderers try to end the life of his new lord.

Desperate times cause for desperate measures and when the Clan of the Fox flees, first Northumberland and then Iceland, the Viking warriors have no idea of the world they will find when they sail across the endless ocean. It is not just the sea and the weather which tries to kill them; it is the animals in the land that they find and it is the Skraeling, the natives who see them as a threat from the east. The clan flees danger but finds more in this new world in the west. When divisions emerge in the clan then it seems as though they are doomed to die in this savage wilderness.

King Henry V has defeated the French, but he has yet to grasp the crown of France. He returns to finish the job which was begun at Agincourt. At his side is his mentor, Sir William Strongstaff, Knight of the Garter. The oldest man in the army, he has yet to become a mere observer, and he is sent on a diplomatic mission to Burgundy and an alliance with Duke John the Fearless. When the Scots ally with the French and kill the king’s brother in battle, it seems that the campaign is over, but the English archers and men at arms show their enemies that they reign supreme.

Betrayal by friend and foe alike beset Sir John Hawkwood as he enters the murky world of Italian politics. He will emerge from the experience as a true leader of men but first he has to outwit his enemies of which there are many. With Montferrat secured from the Savoyards and with the White Company now firmly in his hands, Sir John Hawkwood leads his men to Pisa where they have been hired to fight the Florentines. The hero of Poitiers is about to enter a world of treachery, intrigue and double dealing for which he is quite unprepared.

The third audiobook in Griff Hosker's exhilarating Soldier of the Queen series.