The Traitor of Sherwood Forest
A Novel
-
-
4.0 • 7 Ratings
-
-
- $11.99
Publisher Description
An immersive, sultry, heart-pounding historical reimagining of the Robin Hood ballads, told through the piercing eyes of one of his spies.
Jane Crowe is an ordinary peasant girl who never dreamed she would work for the infamous Lord of the Greenwood. But when she’s forced out of her home, she has no choice but to turn to Robin Hood for help—and he makes her an irresistible offer. He needs a pair of eyes in the King’s Houses, and quiet, unassuming Jane—who has spent her whole life going unnoticed—will be the perfect spy.
At first, Jane’s work for Robin seems straightforward. She whispers to him about the nobles at King’s Houses and all their secrets, including the new Sheriff of Nottingham, who would like nothing more than to see Robin Hood’s head on a spike. But the more Jane is drawn into Robin’s world, the more she’s drawn to Robin himself—a man as charismatic as he is cunning, capable of plucking at her heart as easily as he notches an arrow. As Robin’s tricks grow increasingly dangerous, and shockingly violent, Jane starts to suspect that her hero cares more about his own legacy than helping the common people—and that despite his declarations of affection, he sees her as just another object to be stolen.
When Robin’s schemes implicate Jane in a brutal murder, she must decide: is she a prize to be won, a pawn to be used and discarded—or is she an equal player in the game between nobles and thieves?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Kaufman debuts with an ambitious if flawed attempt to return Robin Hood to his roots as a "complicated, morally gray medieval trickster," rather than the "squeaky-clean hero" of the movies. The story, set during the reign of King Edward I, centers on young Jane Crowe, who's been displaced from her home after her mother moved in with a lover. Jane's boyfriend, Bran, a member of Robin Hood's band, introduces her to the outlaw, and she offers to be his spy while working as a servant in the King's Houses. Jane is initially heartened by the opportunity to "live a life where no one could tell her who or what she ought to be, which path she ought to take," but her feelings change after Robin Hood's men kill an innocent page whom she'd befriended. Her shift in thinking leads to a dramatic choice that will change her life. Unfortunately, Kaufman's good intentions are largely scuttled by hackneyed and often anachronistic prose and telegraphed plot turns. Other authors, such as Stephen Lawhead in his King Raven trilogy, have done better with a similar concept.
