Dear Author,

This book is a medieval fantasy for the ages. Brilliantly and wonderfully written, I absolutely loved every aspect of this book, and I didn’t want to put it down, but, you know, life needs living. Thank you for such a bright and magical tale!

Bright Swords is my gateway into your worlds. I will be reading The Magicians trilogy post haste!


Yours truly,
J. D. McCoughtry

Thank you NetGalley and PENGUIN GROUP Viking Publishing for the chance to read this e-arc.

𝐻𝒶𝓅𝓅𝓎 𝐵𝑜𝑜𝓀 𝐵𝒾𝓇𝓉𝒽𝒹𝒶𝓎

𝙏𝙝𝙚 𝘽𝙧𝙞𝙜𝙝𝙩 𝙎𝙬𝙤𝙧𝙙
by Lev Grossman
688 pages
@vikingbooks
Pub Day Today!

If you’re longing to take a quest in a fantastical land where anything can happen to anyone, read this hefty volume filled with a motley crew from the Round Table.
This won’t be for every reader, as it is based on Arthurian legend and focuses on the Round Table, but it will be for the fantasy lovers who like an involved quest with many anecdotal vignettes on characters and their origin stories.

I am sure there are some twists that I missed as the more casual fantasy fan who is not a student of Arthur, but I was fairly entertained by these adventures and the occasional laugh out loud when hijinks or witty banter ensued.

If you want to travel in King Arthur’s time with a ragtag crew who wants to keep his legend alive, the do pick up The Bright Sword.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
#knightsoftheroundtable #thebrightsword #newbooks #legendbook #kingarthurbook #currentlyreading #fantasyreads #questbooks #bookreviews #bookreview #newpub #arcreading #summerreading

This is a WOW book. In so many chapters, there are so many WOW moments that it's hard to believe this is the same King Arthur that most readers know. But once you think about it, and this book will definitely make you think about it, what tales and legends most of us know on the subject of King Arthur and the Round Table is all surface. No history of how they came together, no prologue to fill in the "what's next" questions. Lev Grossman has taken the one dimension King Arthur myth and spun it into a three dimensional tale set in a more current universal style. These characters are exceptional. They readily admit their weaknesses and realize their strengths are not very strong, but as a group; their continued search for what is true and right will take readers to places you'd never imagine. I read this over a few days but feel it deserves another reading as now I know the characters and their journeys. This is easily a 10 star book.

Thank you to Penguin Group Viking and NetGalley for allowing me to read a digital ARC of Lev Grossman's "The Bright Sword," with a publication date of July 16, 2024. I have always been enchanted with books and movies on Arthurian mythology, and Mr. Grossman's alternate version was not just a retelling but an entertaining journey. In "The Bright Sword," Collum, a poor young knight, travels to Camelot to compete for a spot at the Round Table. Upon arrival, he discovers King Arthur was killed at the Battle of Camlann two (2) weeks ago and left no heir. But several knights of the Round Table are still alive. It's up to Callum and the rag-tag team of surviving knights—Sir Bedivere, Sir Palomide, and Sir Dinaden—along with courageous females—Nimue, Morgan Lafey, and Queen Guinevere—to find Excalibur, uncover the secrets behind Authur's death, and find the true heir to rule Britain. The action in the story takes place in the past and present as Mr. Grossman provides the backstory of each surviving knight; there were a lot of knights. I must admit, I did figure out the secret of one of the knights before the author's reveal. Mr. Grossman's depiction of Merlin and Sir Lancelot is unique. This saga is filled with magic clashing with Christianity, exciting combat scenes, jousts, hysteria, and wise, take-no-prisoner women! The women in this novel are not damsels in distress.

I had a great time following Collum and his comrades on their quest. However, I think the book could have been 150 pages shorter. While I enjoyed the detailed descriptions and character development, some parts of the story could have been condensed without losing the essence of the narrative. Do they find a true heir? Is Britain saved? Did Sir Lancelot really have an affair with Queen Guinevere? Was Merlin loyal or an opportunist? I recommend reading "The Bright Sword" if you're a fan of Arthurian legend and are seeking a fresh take on it.

The story begins with hopeful young knight Collum, whose dream is to join the Knights of the Round Table. But he arrives in a broken Camelot, where King Arthur and most of his knights have died and there are only a handful of lesser known knights remaining. They must rally to rescue Excalibur, fight the rivals that are backing Lancelot, and restore the kingdom.
Ever since I saw the Disney version of King Arthur's story as a child, I've been fascinated with the tale and all of its retellings. I have to say this is one of my favorites! The world building and character development is just phenomenal! This is my first book by this author and I was so engrossed in the story it was hard to put down. I highly recommend it!

I have a thing for Arthurian tales. I just have to try one when I come across it. When I found out Lev Grossman had written one, I knew I had to have it.
The Bright Sword tells the story of Collum, a young knight who wants to join Arthur’s Round Table. He gets there too late.
He finds a motley assortment of other knights with stories to tell.
Some of these stories were more interesting than others, but there were none that I could say were truly boring.
Grossman brought a good energy and style to Arthur’s Camelot.
Even if you aren’t an Arthurian fan, I think you would find this book worth your time.

This novel reads in many ways like an anthology of fairy tales from childhood. There is a through line plot here, but it does not propel the novel. Instead, each chapter can be read as a connected short story. Lovely bites to enjoy bit by bit.

This was a fun read, but at times it slogged a bit. I found myself super interested in the story (I'll admit that I didn't know much of king Arthur aside from Spam-a-lot spoofs and what has infiltrated into pop culture awareness; I wasn't even fully aware whether he was a real person or not) and I really enjoyed the narrative of Britain after Arthur. The characters were the shining stars in this - Dinadan and Collum and the rest were all so lovable and you couldn't help root for them.

The pacing in this is my biggest issue. It seemed off. There were parts where I struggled to maintain my attention, and I skimmed over paragraphs because they seemed overwritten. I do not feel like I missed much of the story doing this, either. I feel like this could have been edited down quite a bit and still been very good. However, I have to admit this might be because I am not the ideal reader for this book - I got annoyed with the battle scenes and sword fights and endless travel narrative. I loved the past looks at the knights, and last 1/3 of the book felt great to me, but the middle 1/3 just seemed like a bit of a slog.

Overall, this is an interesting retelling of historical myth and was well written if a bit slow for my tastes.

This is a delightful book. Overall, it was a healthy dose of adventure, surrealism, and humor. A portion of the plot makes light of the tedious task of questing, but that and the many backstories made the book drag in middle. I would not have been surprised to read a backstory about some random rock. Should the story be adapted for the screen, I hope the creators find a way satirize and wink at the many montages this story would require. The tone of the ending seemed a little incongruous with the rest of the book, but it wrapped everything up nicely.

Knights of the Round Table, fantasy and the stuff that legends are made of. A large novel that took quite a while to absorb, but nonetheless, enjoyable. My first book by this author...interesting! My thanks to NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Taking place after the death of King Arthur, although when we first meet Callum our main character, he doesn't know that yet. Callum makes his way to Camelot and meets the survivors of the battle that took Arthur and ends up going on a quest with them so they can stop other kingdoms from taking the throne.
I liked the premise, and as naive as Callum comes across I liked him as a main character. We do get snippet chapters from the other knights pov, but as long as this book is the bits we get from the other characters didn't give me any deeper connection to them. I did love the bits from the ladies of the story. Nimue and Morgan le Fay, then later Guinevere, they had some great scenes and I definitely would have loved even more from them.

All in all, I think this book was just too long, while I really enjoyed some parts, for most of it I found myself bored, and had a hard time wanting to pick up it up after putting it down.

The Bright Sword takes us on a journey of epic proportions. We follow the main character Collum who struggles with the feeling of not being good enough, which I think most people can relate to. From being abandoned by his parents to living with the horrible Alisdair, he had a pretty horrible upbringing being abused and beaten. We follow his journey up to the present day where he eventually was able to be trained towards becoming a knight and now that he is old enough he heads off to Camelot with the hope to join the Knights of the Round Table.

I loved the mythos and how the religious lines were blurred, how the old ways and pagan rituals wrapped their tentacles into Christianity, and the question of whether God had abandoned and left these people. The battles fought are intense and magical, I enjoyed the epicness of this story. The character development is good, the characters are vibrant and full of life, and the story is quite fantastic. My biggest complaint is all of the attempted rape in this book, this is the most I've ever accounted in one book. Sure it was medieval times and in war there are horrible atrocities including rape, but the amount in here felt a bit excessive. Otherwise, this would have been a five-star read.

"The #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Magicians trilogy returns with a triumphant reimagining of the King Arthur legend for the new millennium.

A gifted young knight named Collum arrives at Camelot to compete for a spot on the Round Table, only to find that he's too late. The king died two weeks ago at the Battle of Camlann, leaving no heir, and only a handful of the knights of the Round Table survive.

They aren't the heroes of legend, like Lancelot or Gawain. They're the oddballs of the Round Table, from the edges of the stories, like Sir Palomides, the Saracen Knight, and Sir Dagonet, Arthur's fool, who was knighted as a joke. They're joined by Nimue, who was Merlin's apprentice until she turned on him and buried him under a hill. Together this ragtag fellowship will set out to rebuild Camelot in a world that has lost its balance.

But Arthur's death has revealed Britain's fault lines. God has abandoned it, and the fairies and monsters and old gods are returning, led by Arthur's half-sister Morgan le Fay. Kingdoms are turning on each other, warlords lay siege to Camelot and rival factions are forming around the disgraced Lancelot and the fallen Queen Guinevere. It is up to Collum and his companions to reclaim Excalibur, solve the mysteries of this ruined world and make it whole again. But before they can restore Camelot they'll have to learn the truth of why the lonely, brilliant King Arthur fell, and lay to rest the ghosts of his troubled family and of Britain's dark past.

The first major Arthurian epic of the new millennium, The Bright Sword is steeped in tradition, full of duels and quests, battles and tournaments, magic swords and Fisher Kings. It also sheds a fresh light on Arthur's Britain, a diverse, complex nation struggling to come to terms with its bloody history. The Bright Sword is a story about imperfect men and women, full of strength and pain, who are looking for a way to reforge a broken land in spite of being broken themselves."

Everyone has been waiting to see what Lev Grossman would do next. The answer? Awesomely it's Arthurian Legend!

I haven’t read a good Arthur book in a while. This one is great. Weird, fantastical, strange, and moving by turns, rarely did I know what to expect next and that’s what made it a perfect Round Table quest narrative. Also, 10/10 historical math joke.

A fun book but slow developed plot. Supposed to be a Camelot story but not really. I just did not get excited about this book b

I’ve enjoyed this author’s other books so I did think this would be more of a fun take on the Arthur story. However after reading about 35% of the book I realized it was not that way. The book is very long and drawn out, and really drags honestly. Mostly it is looking back in time and everyone is having a terrible life. Then it just kind of ends. After I got the third of the way in I skimmed the rest just to get it off my reading list. I can’t recommend this but for others who like Arthurian legend it may be different.

I have always loved King Arthur. From Rosemary Sutcliff to Malory, I have devoured every book I could get my hands on, but as I've gotten more aware, I've seen the many issues that bringing Arthur into the present day offers. Lev Grossman gives me an alternative that I can thoroughly embrace and celebrate, just as it celebrates all of us. I loved it.

I've been a fan of Lev Grossman's for a long time. This one just didn't stick the landing for me. I think setting it into such a familiar scene, but not including many of the classic characters felt a bit off for me.

I wanted so badly to love this. Lev Grossman reinvented fantasy with his astounding "Magician's" trilogy and I was poised to offer him similar aclaim for Arthurian legend. I think if you're a fan of Arthur and the many tales of his round table you will find much to love here. But for casual fantasy fans who've seen "The Sword in the Stone" or love the musical "Camelot" this may simply be too dense and too long, as it was for me. Grossman's writing remains as witty, wonderfully descriptive, and whimsically sarcastic as ever but I struggled to find a character to hang my hat on. While much of the narrative centers on young Camelot hopeful Callum considerable time is also given to the last of Arthur's knights, those happy few who survived his last war with Mordred, his widowed Queen Guenivere, Merlins' erstwhile lady love Nimue and Morgan Lafey, queen of the faeries. All of their stories are wonderful and frankly deserving of their own books or at least novella's but its so much to pack into one volume. I kept losing track of the story. It was also hard to ever get a sense of where I was being taken on this epic journey. And while I recognize that the journey is often the point its hard to go along with that when the central question is "what do we do now that Arthur's gone?" It is truly wonderful the way Grossman has pulled from such a cast array of sources (I even detected some Monty Python more than once), his respect for the sheer volume of stories, poems, theatrical pieces, songs etc. about Arthur that have been spun for literally hundreds of years is evident and I'm sure in years to come this book will be right up there with all the others.

I just finished "The Bright Sword" by Lev Grossman. I received a free eARC from NetGalley.

Collum has wanted to be a knight for as long as he can remember. Growing up as the bastard son of a fisherman, in the abusive home of a local Lord, tales of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table were the only thing that gave him hope. He finally sets out on his epic quest-- to Camelot, only to arrive too late. The King is dead. The Table is left in tatters-- only a handful of knights remain. As the remaining knights grapple with the legacy of Arthur-- and the painful reality of a Britain without him, they must face down some old foes and new threats to set things right. Filled with retellings of classic Grail Quests, as well as some new adventures, The Bright Sword reimagines the world of King Arthur as only Grossman could.

I will preface this by saying that I am a HUGE Magicians fan. Lev Grossman is a brilliant author-- and I love the way he inverts tropes and gives his character exactly what they want... with a twist. I think that The Bright Sword is a wonderful modern submission in the Legend of King Arthur-- and there are definitely some surprises in store through Grossman's modern lens, but overall it felt like a rehashing of a story I'm not entirely sure needed to be rehashed. Collum is a welcome addition to the Knights-- he's brave, and loyal, and earnest; but he's also a liar, a thief, and a backyard brawler. There are moments when Collum accepts those parts of himself, and there are moments when he falls into the trap of trying to be Divine perfection. Since we only have fringe members of the Table left, Grossman lets us take a peek into their adventures and past, in order to inform the present. He takes the usual liberties with timelines and historical accuracy (I will not fault him for that-- as he points out in the Afterwards, that is the foundation of the Arthurian tradition), but twists some of the tales to a more modern bent. There's some gender-bending, and some examination of the way in which gender informs these legends, but he never commits to them fully enough to really condemn them or dismantle them. I thought this was a really excellent book overall, I just thought it was missing some of the sardonic humor and sarcasm that I've come to expect from Grossman.