Book Review for

Agincourt: A Novel
by Bernard Cornwell

Nicholas Hook is a highly skilled English archer who hears a voice from heaven
telling him to save a young girl. He fails to do so and then punches the priest who
rapes her. To avoid being hanged, he is sent with other archers to Soissons, France,
 to assist the Duke of Burgundy in a feud with his cousin the King of France. Another
rape is about to occur, and this time Hook, hearing the voices of St. Crispin and
St. Crispinian, redeems himself and kills the would-be-rapist. The battle of Soissons
is lost, and Nicholas flees to the English-held town of Calais with the nun he saved
from being raped, Melisande. They are sent to London to serve under the King of
England, Henry V, who is gathering 12,000 men to fight the King of France.

Nicholas is trained by Sir John Cornwaille, the most feared tournament fighter
in Christendom, unbeatable in battle with a sword, and a trainer of men:
"That's how you do it!" he shouted at the archers, "you rip their bellies open,
shove blades in their eyes, slice their throats, cut off their bullocks, drive swords
up their arses, tear out their gullets, gouge their livers, skewer their kidneys.
I don't care how you do it, so long as you kill them!"

 This is a rousing adventure tale woven into one of the most remarkable battles
in medieval Europe ,the true, historical account of how the outnumbered English
army defeated the French during the famous, bloody battle of Agincourt!

 
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