Your Questions

Dear Mr. Cornwell,

 

I have only just discovered the Sharpe series! Reading away, looking forward to Sharp's assassin when I get a new copy.

With all the speculation about Sharpe's father, will we ever know for certain of his lineage? In my googling I learned how your own father produced the wonderful family lineage, with the name Uthred in it. I have seen the carefully maintained lineage of my Serbian brother in law's family, and am so very happy for you that you found your true family.

I also felt Jane never paid up enough. After the loss of his little family I thought the Jane Gibbons episode was terribly harsh. I hope there are some happier times ahead for poor old Sharpe. But then, who else could rival Hakeswell, in bringing misery and thickening plots.

Why is Sharpe such a pushover for women? Is it the PTSD? Will he ever get the better of one of them and not be left flat broke ? Will his daughters take good care of their grumpy papa, in spite of him? I hope they do. Daddies are an anchor for their daughters and only on the rare occasion do we hang them out to dry (they need to be narcissistic villains of the lowest ilk for that to happen). My mother lost her father as a child, and she still looks for him everywhere.

The historical comments about the battle fields are masterly touch. They are the icing on the cake for me, as we were given a taste for historical events growing up, with visits to places of import. I look forward to any further works and sincerely hope if they do continue the tv series, they stay closer to the books. My daddy says the only books worth reading were written before the 19oo's, but I think you are an exception.

Cheers!

And I wish you the happiness of the day if you're working on a new project.

Evie

Simple question: when is Sharpe getting his knighthood?  He has performed huge service to the crown and saved Wellington's bacon on more than one occasion (Multiple times at Waterloo!). I know that he must have made many enemies along the way ("Sharpe's Regiment" for example) but a brave and loyal man must be rewarded!

( Very tongue in cheek btw!)

Pyers  Symon

Dear Mr Cornwell

I've been digging into family history and was rather surprised to trace a link to Uchtred the Bold, which was a delight as we've been getting great pleasure from following his 'ancestor's exploits for many years now. I notice on your website a comment on Fletcher's 'Bloodfeud'; would you recommend this as a good account of the history?

 

Best wishes

 

Justin

Dear Bernard!

Despite having countless women, Uhtred (according to my count) “only” fathers four children in his lifetime. What are your thoughts, are there more and they go unmentioned, did Uhtred take active measures against spawning more offspring or did it simply not fit into your story that he’d have more? I’m especially curious if you think he’d have any “random” illegitimate children without his knowledge.

Best wishes and thank you very much for your books

Paul

 

Dear Mr Cornwell,

I am on book 3 of The Last Kingdom series (after a recommendation from James Dellingpole)  There was a discussion going on his chat (which is nominally Christian) about whether Uhtred was fashionably anti Christian or not. Someone commented that the Christian characters are like modern day snivelling civil servants.  I don't think i quite agree and while as a Christian i don't quite feel i'm in the same safe pair of hands that i am reading say CS Lewis or Tolkein i accept that the protagonist narrator is a pagan and accept seeing the world through his eyes and here and there the Christians are seen in a 'redeeming' light.  Overall i enjoy the books and feel i have got over my slight hestiancy over whether i should be letting your narrative voice into my inner being !  I hope that doens't sound precious but reading for me can be intimate and i am sensitive to books that are (especially today) filled with politically correct virtue signalling and some of this is often (for example) pro Islam and anti Christian - eg films and books about the crusades.  I do NOT think you are guilty of this and i am enjoying the books immensely.  However i am led to assume that you are substantially more sympathetic to the pagan view point.  I hope you are self critical enough to know that often modern ideas of paganism can be grossly romantic though i don't think you're guilty of that as your books seem pretty realistic.  I am curious to know what your response to this would be and i think us Christian sympathtic readers who you have not quite alienated would be interested to know to what extent your writing is a reflection of your world view or to what extent you feel they are purely written from the perspective of the pagan Uhtred.  But i actually meant to just ask you for some good history books covering the period of the Last Kingdom so i could understand more about this fascinating period.  I live in Northumberland so am in the midst of the setting of these books.  3 or 4 really good books covering this period but if possible focusing on Northumberland especially in relation to the followers of St Cuthbert and also how Northumberland and it's leaders related to the wonderful King Alfred.

Thank you for your time

Dan Ashton

Northumberland

 

Hello Mr.Cornwell

I hope you are having a good day. My question is would Uhtred's fortress of Bebbanburg still be active around during the reign of Cnut the Great in 1016. Also what do you think Uhtred's reaction would if he ever visited to the Rome.

Tevin Daniels

Dear Bernard

Rodney is highly regarded especially with his victory of the Battle of the Saintes in 1782 but I wonder what your thoughts were on his sack of the Island of St Eustatius and whether as have some have speculated whether it amounts to a war crime even by standards of the day ?

https://morethannelson.com/capture-st-eustatius-3-february-1781/

Regards

Geraint

I have just finished my annual audiobook listen (sorry; small kids) to all of your books, and next I have James Clavell’s Asia Saga.

I’ve never reached out to an author before but I just wondered if there are any little ‘head nods’ to Clavell’s Tai Pain, say, in Sharpe’s Trafalgar for instance?

Thank you so much for your books.

Ben Potter

Good Afternoon Bernard,

I have just finished reading the Saxon chronicles and whilst I loved every minute of them, I now find a reading void that I am struggling to fill.

I am from the Wirral and enjoy local history, particularly surrounding the Norse settlers located on the peninsular. Could you perhaps recommend any good reads.

Thanks you for immersing me in those 13 books. It was a welcome distraction.

Kind regards,

Phil

Dear Bernard

I wondered if you'd read Donald Graves excellent book Guns Across the River on the unknown Battle of the Windmill in 1838. Be a great opportunity to see both Sharpe and his son Patrick Lassan fight together. Besides Sharpe has to go to Canada anyway to make peace with Fredrickson too.

Regards

Geraint

https://www.amazon.com/Guns-Across-River-Windmill-2013-07-09/dp/B01A68QFJK?ref_=d6k_applink_bb_marketplace