Scarlet: The King Raven Trilogy - Book 2

published	September 18th 2007 by Thomas Nelson
binding	Hardcover
isbn	1595540865 (isbn13: 9781595540867)
pages	512
description	After losing everything he owns, forester Will Scarlet embarks on a search for none other than King Raven, whose exploits have already become legen...more [close] After losing everything he owns, forester Will Scarlet embarks on a search for none other than King Raven, whose exploits have already become legendary. After fulfilling his quest--and proving himself a skilled and loyal companion--Will joins the heroic archer and his men. Now, however, Will is in prison for a crime he did not commit. His sentence is death by hanging--unless he delivers King Raven and his band of cohorts. That, of course, he will never do. Wales is slowly falling under the control of the invading Normans, and King William the Red has given his ruthless barons control of the land. In desperation, the people turn to King Raven and his men for justice and survival in the face of the ever-growing onslaught. From deep in the forest they form a daring plan for deliverance, knowing that failure means death for them all. <em>Scarlet </em>continues Stephen R. Lawhead's riveting saga that began with the novel <em>Hood, </em>which relocated the legend of Robin Hood to the Welsh countryside and its dark forests. Steeped in Celtic mythology and the political intrigue of medival Britain, Lawhead's trilogy conjures up an ancient past and holds a mirror to contemporary realities. Prepare for an epic tale that dares to shatter everything you thought you knew about Robin Hood. [close]
date added	04-11-07 edit book

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Cheryl rated it:

06/01/08

Will Scarlet is in a bad way. He’s languishing in prison, more of a dungeon really, for a crime he didn’t commit-raising rebellion against King “Red” William. Even though Will readily admits to the reader he’s guilty of many crimes, one of which is poaching the royal venison, he’s never uttered a word or committed an act against the throne. But that minor detail is of little matter to his captors, the foreign Normans. He’ll swing from the end of a hangman’s noose as soon as his...more
Will Scarlet is in a bad way. He’s languishing in prison, more of a dungeon really, for a crime he didn’t commit-raising rebellion against King “Red” William. Even though Will readily admits to the reader he’s guilty of many crimes, one of which is poaching the royal venison, he’s never uttered a word or committed an act against the throne. But that minor detail is of little matter to his captors, the foreign Normans. He’ll swing from the end of a hangman’s noose as soon as his usefulness to Count de Braose and Cardinal Ranulf de Bayeux is done. Ranulf has assigned a young priest, “a young laggard of a scribe” to “catch my wild tales and pin them to the pages of a book to doom us all.” Will’s job is to make his “wild tales” interesting enough to prolong his life, but not give anything away regarding King Raven and his band of outlaws.

That is where Will’s real value to his captors resides. King Raven and his band of renegades are the scourge of the Welsh countryside-if you’re a hated Norman. A starving
Welshman discovering food or money on his doorstep takes a very different view of the elusive King. The Normans can’t capture the outlaw, but they have one of his own and intend to use Will to their full advantage.

Will Scarlet wasn’t always on the lam. A forester, he lived on the lands of Thane Aelred. (A thane was a man who wasn’t entirely noble or common, but somewhere in between.). Side by side Will and Aelred worked together, as had their fathers before them. But Aelred lost his generational lands in political upheaval and his tenants lost their homes. The buildings were burned, the people turned out, and Aelred sent into exile. His lands were placed under the dreaded Forest Law-a law which placed common lands in the hands of the crown in the form of a hunting preserve, depriving the people of their ancestral hunting grounds and starving them in the process. As things went from bad to worse, Will decided to return to the land of his mother’s birth, Wales, and see if he could join the mysterious King Raven’s band.

Finds them he does and becomes a valuable member of the band. But one raid lands the outlaws a mysterious treasure. Recovery of the stolen goods becomes paramount to the Count and Cardinal, giving the duo reason to use whatever means necessary to accomplish their goals. Deciphering the mystery in the renegades’ possession may restore King Raven’s lands. But keeping the goods long enough to discover their meaning means Welsh blood, including Scarlet’s, will begin to flow.

The King Raven trilogy is a re-telling of the story of Robin Hood. Scarlet is the second book in the series and much of the story is told from Will’s point of view. Mr. Lawhead’s writing in the first two books pulled me back in time, when England was invaded by Normans and the sufferings the native populations endured under a tyrannical rule rival anything heard on the news today. It is the continuing story of a small group of people, led by a displaced king, determined to reclaim the land and kingdom settled by their ancestors, now under foreign rule. A twist at the end of Scarlet ensures I’ll be reading Tuck (as in Friar Tuck, introduced in the first book and making appearances in the second) when it comes out in 2009.

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