Camelot by Giles Kristian BLOG TOUR @GilesKristian @TransworldBooks #Camelot #TenThingsAboutMe

Britain is a land riven by anarchy, slaughter, famine, filth and darkness. Its armies are destroyed, its heroes dead, or missing. Arthur and Lancelot fell in the last great battle and Merlin has not been seen these past ten years. Now, the Saxons are gathering again, their warbands stalk the land, their king seeks dominion. As for the lords and kings of Britain, they look only to their own survival and will not unite as they once did under Arthur and his legendary sword Excalibur.

But in an isolated monastery in the marshes of Avalon, a novice of the order is preparing to take his vows when the life he has known is suddenly turned upside down in a welter of blood. Two strangers - the wild-spirited, Saxon-killing Iselle and the ageing warrior Gawain - will pluck the young man from the wreckage of his simple existence. Together, they will seek the last druid and the cauldron of a god. And the young man must come to terms with his legacy and fate as the son of the most celebrated yet most infamous of Arthur's warriors: Lancelot.

For this is the story of Galahad, Lancelot’s son – the reluctant warrior who dared to keep the dream of Camelot alive . . .

Camelot by Giles Kristian was published in hardback on 14 May 2020 by Bantam Press / Transworld.
As part of the #RandomThingsTours Blog Tour, I'm delighted to welcome the author today; he's telling us 'Ten Things About Me'.

Ten Things About Me - Giles Kristian

1.     I’m half Norwegian. My mother is from Bergen on Norway’s west coast. We had a family house on a little island called Brimsholmen, on the edge of the fjords, for twenty-two years. We sold it in 2015 and I miss it so very much. The fjords are always calling me.

2.     I had trials for Leicester City as a goalkeeper. Sadly, I didn’t get the job.

3.     I was the first member of my family to go to university and the first to drop out. For the brief time I was there, I studied English Literature/Language, because I knew I wanted to become a writer. I dropped out to form a pop group.

4.     I’ve had four hit records as a singer, made music videos in the Swiss Alps, Miami, Mexico, Prague, Frankfurt and… Bognor Regis. After the band, I toured as a solo artist in Europe before settling down to start writing a novel set during the First Crusade. That story was never published and is still in my drawer.

5.     As a singer I’ve performed on the same bill as Dame Shirley Bassey, Eric Clapton, The Backstreet Boys, Take That, Status Quo, The Spice Girls, U2, Peter Andre, Ant and Dec, Boyzone, Wet Wet Wet, Kylie Minogue, and Pulp, to name but a few.   

6.     To earn money while writing my first novel, Raven: Blood Eye, I did modelling jobs for the likes of Magnum ice creams, Harp Lager, Daniel Hechter and WKD alcopops, as well as TV adverts for DFS sofas. Anything to fund the writing habit! Then I moved to New York where I lived for nearly three years and worked for a movie marketing company, but mostly worked on my first Viking novels, Raven Blood Eye and Sons of Thunder.

7.     I co-wrote a novel with Wilbur Smith called Golden Lion, which was the no. 1 bestseller across three continents. It was quite an experience.

8.     I’m a brand ambassador for Graham London watches and for Norwegian recliner brand Stressless. All I need now is a bourbon company to call.

9.     In 2013 I was lucky enough to row Draken Harald Hårfagre, the largest replica Viking ship ever built, as part of her sea trials off Karmøy on Norway’s west coast. It was then, amongst the row benches, that my oarmates and I discovered a new insult to use in my Viking novels: Arse welt.

10.  I do the narrative design for video games. My latest is a Viking game called NORSE, a turn-based strategy game in which you can take to your longship to launch lighting raids, discover new lands, trade furs for exotic spices, silver and wine, and forge your own legend. The game will be released in 2021. https://www.norsethegame.com/

© Giles Kristian - May 2020 

Family history (he is half Norwegian) and a passion for the fiction of Bernard Cornwell inspired Giles Kristian to write. 
Set in the Viking world, his bestselling Raven and The Rise of Sigurd trilogies have been acclaimed by his peers, reviewers and readers alike. 
In The Bleeding Land and Brothers’ Fury, he tells the story of a family torn apart by the English Civil War. 
He also co-wrote Wilbur Smith’s No.1 bestseller, Golden Lion. 
In his most recent novel, the Sunday Times bestseller Lancelot, Giles plunged into the rich waters of the Arthurian legend. For his next book, he continues his epic reimagining of our greatest island ‘history’.
Giles Kristian lives in Leicestershire. 

Twitter @GilesKristian
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