Here Lies Arthur Book

Gwynna is just a girl who is forced to run when her village is attacked and burns to the ground. To her horror, she is discovered in the wood. But it is Myrddin the bard who has found her, a traveler and spinner of tales. He agrees to protect Gwynna if she will agree to be bound in service to him. Gwynna is frightened but intrigued-and says yes-for this Myrddin serves the young, rough, and powerful Arthur. In the course of their travels, Myrddin transforms Gwynna into the mysterious Lady of the Lake, a boy warrior, and a spy. It is part of a plot to transform Arthur from the leader of (con't)

(con'd from summary) a ragtag war band into King Arthur, the greatest hero of all time.

If Gwynna and Myrrdin's trickery is discovered, what will become of Gwynna? Worse, what will become of Arthur? Only the endless battling, the mighty belief of men, and the sheer cunning of one remarkable girl will tell.

Publishers Weekly

The last word is "Hope," yet Reeve (Mortal Engines) injects deep cynicism into every other phrase of this Arthurian fable. As he tells it, Myrddin the "enchanter" is a charlatan of high degree, possessing no magic but a mastery of storytelling and fraud. Gwyna, the narrator, is perhaps nine years old when Myrddin sees her swim down a river to escape a house set afire by callous, marauding warlord Arthur. Myrddin promptly disguises her first as the Lady of the Lake and then as a boy apprentice. Gwyna soon learns to trust no one, doubt everything and scorn both male and female roles. She even becomes skeptical of the empire-building ambition behind Myrddin's efforts to recast Arthur's unremarkable exploits as the stuff of legend. Nodding to canon and history while not particularly following either (Lancelot and Morgan le Fay are notably absent), Reeve, like Myrddin, turns hallowed myth and supple prose to political purposes, neatly skewering the modern-day cult of spin and the age-old trickery behind it. Smart teens will love this. Ages 12-up. (Nov.)

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