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I bought 'Outlaw' the other day, as I had read favourable reviews about it.

The book is meant to be a darker, more adult Robin Hood tale.

Is it arse. It's pureile rubbish. Bit of bonking, totally inappropriate swearing (the word 'feth' but not-Dakka safe version is used multiple times. Which considering it's set in the 12th Century is a bloody good trick, seeing as the word was first noted in the 15th Century), and just mindless, rubbish fight scenes, where the Protaginist is largely reduced to standing at the back providing Robin and his men polite applause for particularly less-dull kills. It lacks any and all originality (other than pointing out the rather gray moral behaviour of Robin and his men) and is more reminiscence of the pub Gobshite about a War he clearly never fought in.

Utter, utter arse. Avoid it like Ye Olde Plague Of Boyles.

I've never even heard of it. Cheers for the heads up, I'll be sure to burn a copy or two if I see it at the library where I work.

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

Utter, utter arse. Avoid it like Ye Olde Plague Of Boyles.

Thats no way to speak about susan

I'll be sure to buy some for use as toilet paper. Thanks for the heads up.

I'm sure I understood at least one word from that post, maybe. MDG is displeased...

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:Is it arse. It's pureile rubbish. Bit of bonking, totally inappropriate swearing (the word 'feth' but not-Dakka safe version is used multiple times. Which considering it's set in the 12th Century is a bloody good trick, seeing as the word was first noted in the 15th Century)[.]

I believe you that the book sucks, but you do know in the 12th century they spoke Middle English, right? So really any Modern English in the book is a good trick, considering it's set in the 12th century.

The problem is, most people wouldn't be able to read it if it was written in the authentic language of the time...

And yet had he bothered to use middle english swearies (instead of referring to his manhood as Rick but spelt with a silent P for instance) then I might have been marginally impressed.

But no. Clearly he has taken the 'Torchwood Series 1' approach where to give a book an Adult theme, take essentially a kids story, and chuck in lots of inappropriate swearies and some bonking.

On the bright side, there is a big shiny sticker on the front declaring 'As good as Bernard Cornwell or your money back!' Guess who is taking them up on that?

Isn't the F word old english / anglo-saxon for sexual intercourse? So strictly speaking couldn't it have been used in the 12th century?

Sorry for being pedantic btw

Yeah, but barely anyone would understand the Middle English curse words either. And it would be kind of weird to have a whole book in Modern English, with strange Middle English curse words interspersed through-out. I'm sure they had some offensive equivalent to "Feth" in Middle English anyway.

But I mean really, isn't complaining about using modern language in a modern book set in the 12th century sort of like complaining that nobody says "Scheiße" in an English translation of a book set in Germany?

Not really. It's posting it's self as a Historical Novel, and cannot even be arsed to use appropriate language.

And I think you generally get the gist of sweares and curse words when they are used in context. And then you are sparked to go search the Intertubewebs to find out what the word really meant, and when it matches, you feel all smart.

The book is just incredibly badly written. Seriously, I read a lot of Black Library fantasy novels, and this waste of a tree makes them look like works of Shakespeare by comparisson.

Maybe it's worth posing the question, if the book was well written and the story was awesome and was just in general a good book, would the use of modern language be enough to turn you off the book?

If it didn't posit itself as Historical, not really. But the author, slightly egotistically, claims to have made extensive research, so to get the swearing and general language wrong is just dumb.

Were you expecting the book to read more like Shakespeare or the King James Bible (although neither of those are actually Middle English)? I would think something like that could be easily over-done, and get to the point where it was just cheesy and annoying. To me that would seem more fakey than just writing the book in the current vernacular. Otherwise it could seem more like the author was trying to imitate another language without actually writing in another language.