I hadn’t come across this legend before, so it was really interesting to see how it unfolded. I loved the Arthurian feel to this story, and the world of castles, knights and princesses that Tarutin creates. The author creates an authentic medieval world, one synonymous with medieval romances and the oral tradition of storytelling.

Whilst the book does a great job of capturing the Arthurian legend/almost fairytale like quality of the existing story, the writing at times was overcomplicated where it wasn’t necessary. The language moved between very clear and engaging pieces of prose to ones too heavy and stilted with description.

I enjoyed this novel for its escapist quality and traditional romance characteristics, but at times, the writer’s style was a bit difficult to engage with.


Thank you to NetGalley and SilverWood books for the ARC.

Um no. I don't know how historically accurate this is, I really don't care. I did not enjoy this book even though I wanted to. I do not recommend it.

*I’d like to thank NetGalley, Silverwood Books and Tagai Tarutin for providing me with a free ARC in exchange for an honest review.

“Hellalyle and Hildebrand” is Tagai Tarutin’s first full-length published work, and is a re-telling of the danish ballad “Hellalyle and Hildebrand”, a story about the forbidden love between Princess Hellalyle and her bodyguard Hildebrand, Prince of Engelland. The story was popularised in the Victorian era when the ballad was translated by Whitley Stokes and painted by Frederic William Burton in watercolours which is depicted on the book cover.

I was quite excited to read this novel as I am for one a huge fan of retellings of old tales and stories, and secondly, Hellalyle and Hildebrand had been a story that had fascinated me for a while. Especially since the painting by Burton has captivated me since forever. So my expectations were high as I have read a good amount of amazing retellings that provided a new angle on an old story.

However, Tarutin’s novel could not captivate me. Firstly, I don’t think his retelling added anything to these characters and their story. The characters of Hellalyle and Hildebrand were barely explored, neither was their forbidden love story. There was very little emotional built-up to their relationship, which had much to do in the writing style of the author. Tarutin has the tendency to tell rather than show which takes much of the emotional connection that a reader might develop with the story. There is a huge difference between being told that someone is in love than being shown through action and dialogue. This novel lacked the latter.

I did enjoy how the author gave the other knights some showtime during the story, telling some of their unique stories. However, even here there was a focus only on a chosen few side characters, but never connecting them to the main story in a meaningful way.
Hellalye was barely developed outside her beauty and kind hearted nature. I’d love to see a personality like her show in a different nuance. Why would a well raised, graceful Hellalye fall for a brutish knight? I wished to have seen more than a male gaze version of who she might have been. I wanted a female character with personality, an inner struggle, and constraints of the time she lived in. When she entered the star crossed relationship with Hildebrand she must have known that there was no happy ending for the both, so why did she give in? Why did she sleep with him? What emotional turmoil was she in when she knew that their love had caused his death? Did she feel responsible? Unfortunately, Tarutin did not explore this at all. Nor did he with Hildebrand. For a knight who was revealed his fate to him as a teenager who was still willing to follow his destiny, there was a huge lack of emotional depth and character development. He was a good man with such a holy calling. How did he stumble, how did he fail? What did that do to him? Again nothing.

One can use a more fairytale type storytelling and still manage to create emotional depth and interesting characters. But again Tarutin did fail to find the balance of these. His writing was too fixated to crafted description of environment and setting, but got lost when it came to his characters. Also, his writing was slightly out of harmony, changing his style from a very matter of fact telling to an attempt of oldish storytelling. Not to mention the grammatical errors when the characters used the German language.

Another thing that struck me as odd was the mixture of religious and spiritual beliefs. The story begins with a divine revelation to Hildebrand about his future by a Christian nun on her deathbed. The Holy Ghost is marking him as an important figure. But then Greek mythology, Roman mythology and other pagan beliefs get added to the already religious charged story. The story is constantly walking on a line between a fantastical tale or an historical retelling. I fear it did not convey to me as a reader.

Overall, an idea and concept with great potential that failed in his execution. Retellings are such a great way to explore old tales and stories through a new or even modern lens, exploring characters who were historically seen only one way. Unfortunately, Tarutin did not offer us anything new or life changing. Instead, his story keeps the male gaze of historical figures alive, and seems stuck in his desire to appear literary talented but failing to write compelling characters.

Interesting and I loved the story, but I found the writing a bit formal, stiff and disconnected, Ithink if I enjoyed the writing more it would have been 4 stars

Thanks to NetGalley for access to a copy for review.

I requested this book from NetGalley because I love the painting used on the cover. Love it. So I have some familiarity with the story on which the story is based. Hellalyle and Hildebrand is a re-telling of an old story. I'm pretty sure this was filed under romance on NetGalley - it is not genre romance. It is something like a medieval fairytale centered on a love story.

Hildebrand is a prince of England and Hellalyle is the princess of a realm to the East (Baltic region). Her father and brothers must lave the kingdom due to external threats. The king summons several knights from other kingdoms to guard princess Hellalyle. Hildebrand is their leader.

This is story of chivalry, knights, princesses, love, visions, and tragedy.

The writing style is what keeps me from giving more stars. I find the style really old-fashioned and distant. With occasionl word choices that pull me out.

The synopsis of this story had my name written all over it. However, I have mixed feelings after completing the book. I am struggling to find the right words as to where or what it failed to deliver on for me because I love medieval stories, fantasy, strong female characters - seemingly everything this book has - but it was just OK for me. It's not a bad story but as other reviewers said it's just not for everyone. It is a bit heavy on the narrative for me but it does have its moments. It also has some great pictures to accompany it. Overall I would rate it 3.5 stars. Thanks to NetGalley, the author and publisher for an advanced copy in exchange for my honest opinion.

I love medieval stories, and thought this was a different, interesting romance novel. While it may not be for all readers, and is best enjoyed slowly, it was an entertaining read for me.

Beautifully written and romantic medieval historical fiction with a fairytale feel and a bittersweet conclusion. Really enjoyable. And The Meeting on the Turret Stairs is an interesting choice of inspiration.

"Hellelil sitteth in bower there,
None knows my grief but God alone,
And seweth at the seam so fair,
I never wail my sorrow to any other one..."

About two weeks before I got the ARC for this title (Thank you to NetGalley and Tagai Tarutin!), I kept seeing the panting on the cover of the book, "The Meeting on the Turret Stairs" by Frederic William Burton EVERYWHERE (especially TikTok, of all places). I think part of the recurring popularity of this work (according to Wikipedia, "it was voted by the Irish public as Ireland's favorite painting in 2012 from among 10 works shortlisted by critics") is in its inevitable sorrow. Boy meets girl. Boy falls in love with girl. Girl's father orders her seven brothers to kill boy because medieval tragedy. Tale as old as time.

I love the creative effort that went into trying to give this painting a more resolute ending - I'll leave the interpretation of whether it's a happy ending or nor to the reader, since I think it's worth investigating for yourself. Rather than just taking the painting as a writing prompt and running with it, I really appreciate that the author fully ran with the theme in constructing the narrative - the perspective and language reads as if this was a book on the shelves with tales of King Arthur, merlin, and Morgana Le Fay. The text is thick with iconic imagery, references to Christianity and the spiritual world, and even contains supernatural/magical elements. The characters are, figuratively and literally, larger-than-life, and definitely have been doused in the medieval dramatic characterization you can see in both Shakespearian works and in classic Walt Disney films where the goal of storytelling is to make sure you know who is the good guy and who is the bad (this is not meant to be derogatory, I think the way the narrative writes by its nature falls into this kind of characterization). I definitely felt that the author wanted to evoke the kinds of feelings you get when you look at 15th/16th century paintings of medieval times when writing (and in fact there are some paintings included between chapters that give more of this flavor to the reading).

This was definitely out of the realm of things I usually read, but I'm glad I did! I think that this may fall into the category of "this isn't for everyone" in some respects because the text can get pretty dense, but I feel like anyone who was inspired by the painting in some shape or form may enjoy the journey.

4/5 ⭐️
While I really enjoyed this, I am going to preface this review by saying this book may not be for everyone. This is written in the classic fairytale sense of a 3rd person omnipotent narrator that zooms the camera lens in and out and switches who to follow. In general, as I read it, it reminded me obviously of classic Arthurian tales. But it also reminded me of Tristan & Isolde and the Princess Bride (in the sense of style of writing) and even George RR Martin’s Fire & Blood or his novellas about Duncan & Egg. If you are a fan of classic fairytales, then I think you’ll really like this. Yes there were times I’ve skimmed. But there were other times I was swooning or laughing. This a was delightful change in pace for me. And again, if you like that style of writing like me, I think you’ll enjoy this.
Thank you to NetGalley and Silverwood Books for providing an advance reader copy of this book for my honest review.