In Mark Twain's 1889 novel A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, Hank Morgan awakes from a blow to the head only to find that he has been mysteriously transported back in time. It is early medieval England, the time of King Arthur and Hank is taken to the Camelot castle by a Knight of the King's. Ridiculed for his funny manner and dress sense, and sentenced to burn at the stake, Hank recovers through an incredible stroke of luck,

It takes a remarkable writer to make an old story as fresh and compelling as the first time we heard it. With The Winter King, the first volume of his magnificent Warlord Chronicles, Bernard Cornwell finally turns to the story he was born to write: the mythic saga of King Arthur.

The tale begins in Dark Age Britain, a land where Arthur has been banished and Merlin has disappeared, where a child-king sits unprotected on the throne, where religion

Arthur Pendragon is king! Crowned and recognized as High King, Arthur is unchallenged on the battlefield, and he melds the country together in a time of promise, as Merlin works in the shadows.

But sinister powers plot to destroy Camelot, and when the witch-queen Morgause—Arthur's own half sister—ensnares him in an incestuous liaison, a fatal web of love, betrayal, and bloody vengeance is woven.