Your Questions

Q

Ulysses S Grant, William T Shernan, Robert E. Lee  and Stonewall Jackson were all better than the Duke of Wellington. Discuss.

 

Thanks

 

Michel Bianco

America

Submitted December 1, 2014

A

No. If you want to discuss it, do, and good luck! Your choice of three Civil War commanders suggests a bias that makes any discussion somewhat futile, and besides, though such a discussion can be enjoyable, in the end it’s meaningless!

Q

Mr Cornwell,

Read all your books... all of them except "The Empty Throne" which should be delivered to my home in Hawaii on Monday Nov 24th... Haven't read Waterloo either but that is coming too...

Just recently re-read all the Sharpe books in chronological order... great fun... also re-read the 1st Starbuck book after realizing I hadn't read all 4... then discovered the series just STOPS!!!... I could understand if Starbuck was killed a year into the war but he isn't and the war is still going on... what happens?... Are you going to complete the series?...

Also liked Sharpe's son that Starbuck met... a few books about him and his time in the French cavalry would be great fun!!!... Did he join the French Army when his dad was alive?... Wonder what Sharpe thought about that...

 

Thank you for so much enjoyment over the years...

 

Best regards

Sean

Submitted December 1, 2014

A

That would be nice, but . . . . not yet, anyway!

Q

Bernard,

I am a huge admirer of your work, and as such, I started reading your Saxon Chronicles, which are amazing, congratulations! But there is one thing that keeps bugging me every time Uhtred describes a ship:

in the series, you describe a regular warship of the time as quite a large vessel, many times carrying crews up to more than 60 men, and having large storage space and elevated bow platforms, as well as a small space beneath the steering platform where Uhtred generally slept. Descriptions, I ( having done some amateur research)  found no to be matching the traditional viking ship standard known today, taking into consideration the  archaeological evidence that has been discovered to date.

I would like to know where have you based your research for the ships described in the series, and if you could tell me where to find proper historically accurate viking ship specifications.

Your huge fan,

Enrico

Submitted December 1, 2014

A

There are so many places to find the information!  I brought material back from the Viking ship museum near Stockholm, but almost any general book on the Vikings will have specifications. Sizes vary, of course, but the large Skuldelev long ship is over 90 feet in length with a beam of almost fifteen feet. That’s a big ship! The Oseberg and Gokstad ships (buried as graves) were over 70 feet long. I’m sorry it bugs you, but there it is! They built large ocean-going ships and, because they were essentially warships, would have commensurately large crews. The large Skuldelev ship is reckoned to have taken at least fifty oars, so a crew of 60 doesn’t seem crazy to me.

Q

Hi,

I really like the warrior chronicals. I'm from Germany so of course I rather read the books in german. My question is when is "the empty throne" available in Germany (german). And of course you might publish the release date in Germany on your website too...

Thank you and keep on going!

Hannes

Submitted November 24, 2014

A

I think you can look for the German translation of The Empty Throne in May 2015.

Q

Hi,

Bit cheeky but I have 3 questions,

Reading your answers to recent questions you are not working on Uthred or Sharpe at the moment so what new treat can we expect?

I set myself to listen to all the Uthred books before reading The Empty Throne and as a relative newcomer to Audio books I'm amazed how brilliant and exiting they are, have you listened back to any of your work. (If not you should)

How about Dr Syn for Shape's dad?

Mike

Submitted November 22, 2014

A

All I'll say about it now is that I am working on a book set during the late 16th century.

I've never listened to any of my books on audio!

Nope.

Q

Dear Mr Cornwell,

I was wondering if you had any plans to publish any more sailing-based thrillers?? I am just buying your latest book for my Dad for Christmas, and I stumbled across the sailing books that I read 20+ years ago (and thought were excellent) whilst reviewing your website.

Just thought I'd ask!

Regards

Duncan

 

Submitted November 22, 2014

A

Maybe....someday....perhaps when I retire!

Q

Mr. Cornwell,

I recently was shown by a friend your Saxon Chronicles series and I very much enjoyed your writing style. That got me into Sharpe(I really do like the Napoleonic Wars) and I am now at middle of Sharpe's Escape. In this book, Major Ferreira and his brother keep saying "os ingleses por mar!". I am Brazilian but this makes no sense whatsoever to me. I'd be extremely pleased if you could enlighten me.

Stay strong, Mr. Cornwell! Sorry for any spelling mistakes and thanks for taking your time to read this.

Mário Lemos

 

Submitted November 22, 2014

A

I’ve no idea!  I wrote the thing so long ago . . . . sorry!

Q

In a message from 'sean' on 14th sept he takes you to task for saying that Osbert (later Uhtred junior ) couldn't have been taught Danish by Gisela as she died giving birth to him. And you apologised!!

Gisela died giving birth to a fourth unnamed child, not Osbert, so she could have taught Osbert Danish.

 

However you have conveniently changed Uhtred;s children's birth order around. It was initially stated that Stiorra was the middle child, but in later books she is the youngest. Not to mention that you also changed the amount of years between them too.

Don't you check continuity?

Cathy

Submitted November 22, 2014

A

I did? It’s his fault, he can never remember his childrens’ birthdays (I confess that I don’t know my daughter’s either, but she’s nice and forgives me).

 

Q

Good morning Mr Cornwell.

I will be quick because I don't want to take your time, but I have been looking for a rune version of "wyrd bið ful aræd" and I would like to know if you could send an image of it written in runes. Thank you very much. Looking forward to your next books, I'm very happy that you released two books this year. Hope you come back to Brazil in the future. Thanks,

Thales H.

 

 

Dear Mr. Cornwell,

first of all I want to thank you for your very interesting and entertaining books, which I enjoy a lot. Especially the Warrior chronicles have a huge impact on me. And the adventures of Uthred are a part of the inspiration I had for a tatoo idea. I want to perpetuate "wyrd bid ful araed" on my skin. Not so difficult. But the clue is, I want it in anglo-saxon runes as well. And I am not an expert in Old English linguistics and because you have this nice contact-thing here on your homepage, I decided to go to the source for help. I would really appreciate your cooperation. I even could send you a draft of mine, so you could have a look on it. Just tell me how I can do that. I could understand, if you are busy, but I am not in a hurry and -by the way- it would be a special pleasure to get the help I search for from you.

I am looking forward to hearing from you.

Keep writing such fantastic books and have a nice day.

Sincerely

Robert Dombrowski

Submitted November 22, 2014

A

I can’t, because I’ve not seen it written in Runes either and I certainly don’t know the Runic alphabet . . . . it comes from a poem, so was handwritten, sorry.