Rosemary Sutcliff Books In Order

Eagle of the Ninth Books In Order

  1. The Eagle of the Ninth (1954)
  2. The Silver Branch (1957)
  3. The Lantern Bearers (1959)
  4. Dawn Wind (1961)
  5. Frontier Wolf (1980)

Legends of King Arthur Books In Order

  1. Sword at Sunset (1963)
  2. The Light Beyond the Forest (1979)
  3. The Sword and the Circle (1981)
  4. The Road to Camlann (1981)

Novels

  1. Chronicles of Robin Hood (1950)
  2. The Queen Elizabeth story (1950)
  3. The Armourer’s House (1951)
  4. Brother Dustyfeet (1952)
  5. Simon (1953)
  6. Outcast (1955)
  7. The Shield Ring (1956)
  8. Lady in Waiting (1957)
  9. Warrior Scarlet (1957)
  10. The Bridge Builders (1959)
  11. The Rider of the White Horse (1959)
  12. Knight’s Fee (1960)
  13. Dragon Slayer (1961)
  14. The Hound of Ulster (1963)
  15. The Flowers of Adonis (1965)
  16. The Mark of the Horse Lord (1965)
  17. The Chief’s Daughter (1967)
  18. The High Deeds of Finn Mac Cool (1967)
  19. A Circlet of Oak Leaves (1968)
  20. The Witch’s Brat (1970)
  21. Tristan and Iseult (1971)
  22. The Truce of the Games (1971)
  23. The Capricorn Bracelet (1973)
  24. The Changeling (1974)
  25. We Lived in Drumfyvie (1975)
  26. Blood Feud (1976)
  27. Sun Horse, Moon Horse (1977)
  28. Shifting Sands (1977)
  29. Song for a Dark Queen (1978)
  30. Eagle’s Egg (1981)
  31. Bonnie Dundee (1983)
  32. Flame-coloured Taffeta (1986)
  33. Blood and Sand (1987)
  34. The Shining Company (1990)
  35. The Minstrel and the Dragon Pup (1993)
  36. Black Ships before Troy (1993)
  37. The Wanderings of Odysseus (1995)
  38. Sword Song (1997)

Omnibus

  1. Eagle’s Honour (2013)

Collections

  1. Heather, Oak, and Olive (1972)
  2. Best of Rosemary Sutcliff (1987)

Picture Books

  1. The Roundabout Horse (1986)
  2. A Little Dog Like You (1987)
  3. Little Hound Found (1989)
  4. Chess-dream in the Garden (1993)

Non fiction

  1. Blue Remembered Hills (1963)
  2. Heroes and History (1965)
  3. A Saxon Settler (1965)
  4. Arthur Ransome, Rudyard Kipling and Walter De La Mare (1968)
  5. Is Anyone There? (1978)

Eagle of the Ninth Book Covers

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Rosemary Sutcliff Books Overview

The Eagle of the Ninth

The Ninth Legion marched into the mists of northern Britain and they were never seen again. Four thousand men disappeared and their eagle standard was lost. It’s a mystery that’s never been solved, until now…
Marcus has to find out what happened to his father, who led the legion. So he sets out into the unknown, on a quest so dangerous that nobody expects him to return. The Eagle of the Ninth is heralded as one of the most outstanding children’s books of the twentieth century and has sold over a million copies worldwide. Rosemary Sutcliff writes with such passion and attention to detail that Roman Britain is instantly brought to life and stays with the reader long after the last page has been turned. The book is also now the subject of a major film.

The Silver Branch

Violence and unrest are sweeping through Roman Britain. Justin and Flavius find themselves caught up in the middle of it all when they discover a plot to overthrow the Emperor. In fear for their lives they gather together a tattered band of men and lead them into the thick of battle, to defend the honour of Rome. But will they be in time to save the Emperor…
Rosemary Sutcliff’s books about Roman Britain have won much acclaim and the first in the trilogy, ‘The Eagle of the Ninth’, has now sold over a million copies worldwide. The author writes with such passion and with such attention to detail that the Roman age is instantly brought to life and stays with the reader long after the last page has been turned.

The Lantern Bearers

The last of the Roman army have set sail and left Britain for ever, abandoning it to civil war and the threat of a Saxon invasion. Aquila deserts his regiment to return to his family, but his home and all that he loves are destroyed. Years of hardship and fighting follow and in the end there is only one thing left in Aquila’s life his thirst for revenge…
Rosemary Sutcliff’s books about Roman Britain have won much acclaim and the first in the trilogy, ‘The Eagle of the Ninth’, has now sold over a million copies worldwide. The author writes with such passion and with such attention to detail that the Roman age is instantly brought to life and stays with the reader long after the last page has been turned.

Frontier Wolf

Britain, A.D. 343. The end of Roman rule. The Antonine Wall has fallen and order slowly collapses on the northernmost edge of the empire. The little protection that Rome has from the Dalriad and Caledone tribes comes from a small post of half wild legionnaires: The Frontier Wolves. During a period of tentative peace in Northern Britain, a young commander is sent to preside over this undisciplined lot at their borderland outpost. Yet Alexios Flavius Aquila knows his assignment to Castellum was not a promotion. After abandoning a fort in the German province during a barbarian attack, the Centurion lost half his men. Were his uncle not the governor of northern Britain, Alexios would not be calling himself a legionnaire at all. Given the circumstances, this exile was humane. In this quick moving historical novel, acclaimed author Rosemary Sutcliff realizes Alexios’s struggles to contain, govern, and ultimately earn the respect of these Frontier Wolves. His tenure with the pack requires a balance, too, between controlling and honoring the tribes that occupy Roman land. During an overwhelming raid at the book’s end, Alexios is faced with the same decision that almost cost him his career. This time, he again orders his men to abandon their fort and leads them on a harrowing trek southward, towards Hadrian’s Wall, and safety. With the vicious Northern tribes at his men’s heels for the entire journey, it is not until he reaches the fort at Habitancum that he knows he chose correctly.

Sword at Sunset

This brilliant reconception of the Arthurian epic cuts through the familiar myths and tells the story of the real King Arthur: Artos the Bear, the mighty warrior king who saved the last lights of Western civilization when the barbarian darkness descended in the fifth century. Artos here comes alive: bold and forceful in battle, warm and generous in friendship, tough in politics, shrewd in the strategy of war and tender and tragically tormented in love. Out of the interweaving of ancient legend, fresh research, soaring imagination, and hypnotic narrative skill comes a novel that has richly earned its reputation as a classic.

The Light Beyond the Forest

A retelling of the adventures of King Arthur’s knights, Sir Lancelot, Sir Galahad, Sir Bors, and Sir Percival, as they search for the Holy Grail.

The Sword and the Circle

A retelling of the classic Arthurian legend follows the adventures of the boy who became a king, his councillor Merlin, his beloved Guinivere, and the Knights of the Round Table. By the author of Tristan and Iseult. Reprint. SLJ. C. NYT.

The Road to Camlann

After years of Arthur’s fair rule, evil has come to Camelot. Mordred, Arthur’s illegitimate son, is determined to destroy the Round Table and gain the throne for himself. He will use whatever tools he can mutiny, force, even the rumors of love between Lancelot and Queen Guenever. In the end, there is only one place for the battle to be lost or won: the bleak plain of Camlann, where Arthur and his knights of the Round Table fight for their lives.

Outcast

Rescued as a baby from a shipwrecked Roman galley, Beric is raised in a British tribe but is never fully accepted by them. When disaster and bad times come to the clan, they believe it is down to Beric that he has brought bad luck and misfortune to them and they cast him out. Left alone without family or friends, Beric is sold into slavery in Rome and then condemned to a life on the rowing bench of a Roman galley. With danger and death all around him, Beric must free himself and try and build a new life.

The Shield Ring

The story takes place in England shortly after the Norman Conquest. High up among the mountains of the Lake District is a secret valley where the Northmen Vikings have their last stronghold or shield ring. The Normans want to crush this last group of Northmen and bring the whole country under their control. To this end they build a castle in Carlisle and send an army north. Life goes on in the valley: lambing, shearing, spinning, harvesting, and singing and storytelling in the great hall in the evenings as narrated by two young people. Frytha is a Saxon girl, who fled to the valley after the Normans burnt her home, and Bjorn, the Bear Cub, is the foster son of the old harper. As the people of The Shield Ring go about their lives, they stay ready for a Norman attack. Bjorn’s foster father teaches him to play the Sweet singer, a special harp that the old harper owns, and despite Bjorn’s enthusiasm, a secret fear burns inside the boy: if the Normans capture Bjorn, he may succumb to torture and reveal the path to the hidden valley. When the Northmen need to scout the extent of the Norman army, Bjorn volunteers: he speaks enough Norman to get by and a harper can go anywhere. The young man sets out for the Norman camp, not knowing that Frytha, an ally, follows him. He does know that if the Normans discover his espionage, though, he will be tortured, and his secret fear from childhood may become a reality.

Warrior Scarlet

In Bronze Age Britain, young Drem must overcome his disability-a withered arm-if he is to prove his manhood and become a warrior.

Knight’s Fee

Out of sight of the patrolling sentinels, Randal sits on the gatehouse roof. The orphan is more at home with the hounds he tends, but he yearns to see the new Lord arrive at Arundel Castle. As he leans over the battlements to watch the procession, a fig slips from Randal’s hand and lands right on the nose of Hugh Goch’s horse. The accident is small, but it will change Randal’s entire life. A game of chess, a brave minstrel, a kind old knight, and a friend will point Randal to squirehood, and his own courage will pave his path to become a knight. Battle between the sons of William the Conqueror makes Randal’s journey in Norman England an exciting one, but intrigue and deceit may take from Randal a heavy Knight’s Fee.

Dragon Slayer

A New York Times Bestseller and Whitbread Book of the Year. Nobel Laureate Seamus Heaney’s new translation of Beowulf comes to life in this gripping audio. Heaney’s performance reminds us that Beowulf, written near the turn of another millennium, was intended to be heard not read. Composed toward the end of the first millennium of our era, Beowulf is the elegiac narrative of the adventures of Beowulf, a Scandinavian hero who saves the Danes from the seemingly invincible monster Grendel and, later, from Grendel’s mother. He then returns to his own country and lives to old age before dying in a vivid fight against a dragon. The poem is about encountering the monstrous, defeating it, and then having to live on in the exhausted aftermath. In the contours of this story, at once remote and uncannily familiar at the end of the twentieth century, Seamus Heaney finds a resonance that summons power to the poetry from deep beneath its surface.

The Hound of Ulster

This saga of the Irish Celts is re told by Rosemary Sutcliff with a magical weaving together of passion and poetry. The boy who takes up the spear and shield of Manhood on this day will become the most renowned of all the warriors of Ireland, men will follow at his call to the world’s end, and his enemies will shudder at the thunder of his chariot wheels. So the prophecy went, and as the boy Cuchulain heard it, he went forward to claim the weapons of his manhood. This is the story of how he became the greatest of heroes The Hound of Ulster.

The Mark of the Horse Lord

Phaedrus, an enslaved gladiator in northern Britain in the first century, earns his freedom by killing his best friend, a fellow gladiator, in a final fight to the death. Within days of leaving the arena he is recruited by leaders of a tribe from the far north to impersonate Prince Midir, who has been robbed of his right to kingship in a brutal attack by followers of the current ruler, Queen Liadhan. As Midir, Phaedrus is charged with reestablishing his kingship and the tribe’s rule in the land. In this world of superstition and ancient ritual, of fierce loyalties and intertribal rivalry, Phaedrus finds companionship and love, and something more a purpose and a meaning for his life as he comes to fully understand the significance of The Mark of the Horse Lord.

Tristan and Iseult

Tristan defeats Ireland’s greatest warrior and gains the friendship of his uncle, the King of Cornwall, who entrusts him with a very special mission: to sail the seas in search of a queen.

Sun Horse, Moon Horse

A young boy in pre Roman England becomes chieftain of his tribe and learns just how much he must sacrifice for his people.

Song for a Dark Queen

The life of Boadicea Boudicca, queen of the Iceni, who led them and other British tribes in a valiant but futile revolt against the Romans in 62 A.D.

Bonnie Dundee

In exile in Holland, Hugh Herriot recalls the exploits of his youth as a follower of Bonnie Dundee who tried to win back Scotland for the Catholic King James and whose death during a victorious battle proved to be a final blow for the Jacobite cause.

The Shining Company

In 600 A.D. in northern Britain, Prosper becomes a shield bearer with the Companions, an army made up of three hundred younger sons of minor kings and trained to act as one fighting brotherhood against the invading Saxons.

The Minstrel and the Dragon Pup

One fine spring day a down at heel minstrel finds a beautiful egg on the seashore. To help it hatch, he plays a tune on his harp. Out comes a dragon pup, no bigger than a kitten and a special friendship is born. This picture book tells of the adventures of the pup and the minstrel.

Black Ships before Troy

Homer’s epic poem, The Iliad, is one of the greatest adventure stories of all time. Rich with arresting imagery and memorable characters, its powerful metaphors still permeate modern culture. This brilliant retelling offers young readers an exciting introduction to the heroes of ancient Greece while providing the complete story of the battle of Troy. The legendary beauty, Helen, is abducted, leading to a decade long conflict in which even the gods and goddesses take sides and intervene. This is the Trojan War, where the most valiant heroes of the ancient world are pitted against one another. Here Hector, Ajax, Achilles, and Odysseus meet their most formidable challenges and in some cases, their tragic ends. Rosemary Sutcliff makes such extraordinary stories as those of the Trojan horse, of Aphrodite and the golden apple, and of the fearsome warrior women, the Amazons, accessible to contemporary young people. Superb illustrations enhance the story’s dramatic appeal.

The Wanderings of Odysseus

The long siege of Troy is over, and the city is in ashes. Heroic King Odysseus can finally return to Ithaca, but the voyage home holds terrors far greater than any he faced during the Trojan War. Storms have thrust Odysseus’s ship into unknown waters. Here he must confront not only the blunders of his crew, but far stranger perils: the one eyed, flesh eating Cyclops; Circe, the enchantress with the power to turn men into swine; the unnerving trip through the Land of the Dead. And when he finally reaches home, he finds his palace overrun by loutish suitors fighting to win the affections of his adored wife Penelope. Odysseus has one last thrilling battle to fight before he can reclaim his wife and his kingdom. Rosemary Sutcliff’s vivid transformation brings Homer’s Odyssey to life for a new generation. While simplified, the story is never ‘dumbed down,’ making it an excellent introduction to Greek mythology for readers of all ages.

Sword Song

Sword Song is the swashbuckling story of Bjarni, a Viking swordsman. Banished from his home for a murder he didn’t intend to commit, Bjarni takes up a new life as a mercenary. He journeys from England to Dublin, and then to the islands off the west coast of Scotland. There he meets the man who is to shape the course of his life for years to come, a life that will lead him from boyhood to manhood fighting among the clan chiefs from the west coast of Scotland in feuds as bitter and bloody as can be imagined. Discovered among her papers after her death in 1992, Sword Song is a fitting capstone to Rosemary Sutcliff’s marvelous career as one of Britain’s premier authors of historical fiction.

Chess-dream in the Garden

Godmund, the White King and Hrosmunda, his Queen, live in warmth and peace with their people in the garden. But one day a coldness arose between the King and the Queen, which allowed the enemy, the Red Horde, to invade the garden, led by a serpent with the head of a man. Then the chessboard at the centre of the garden becomes the battefield for the battle to end all battles. Rosemary Sutcliff’s books include ‘The Eagle of the Ninth’, ‘The Lantern Bearers’ winner of the Carnegie Medal and ‘The Minstrel and the Dragon Pup’.

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