Fallen Angels
Written by Bernard Cornwell
Narrated by Fiona Paul
3.5/5
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About this audiobook
A lost legacy puts one of England’s great families in mortal peril …
Lazen Castle, home to the much-envied Lazender family, is a house under siege. The heir is abroad, pursuing his own adventures, so the family estates fall under the control of his sister, Campion. Meanwhile, The Fallen Angels, a powerful and dangerous secret society in Europe, need the Lazender fortune to bring their rebellion to England.
Surrounded by deceit, Campion draws ever closer to a subtle trap that has been laid for her, her only hope being Gypsy – her brother’s aloof horse-master, whose loyalties have always been uncertain.
In this powerful blend of passion, adventure and intrigue, the second chronicle of the great Lazender family comes to life.
Bernard Cornwell
BERNARD CORNWELL is the author of over fifty novels, including the acclaimed New York Times bestselling Saxon Tales, which serve as the basis for the hit Netflix series The Last Kingdom. He lives with his wife on Cape Cod and in Charleston, South Carolina.
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Reviews for Fallen Angels
46 ratings6 reviews
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5“The Fallen Angels” has a lot of good things going for it, though I prefer the first book of the Crowning Mercy series. I like how the authors have created a sequel that is set in a different era, with brand new characters, yet manage to link this book back to its predecessor. Whereas Book 1 had lots of conflict and dramatic situations, this second book starts out in a similar fashion, yet for most of the middle section it strikes me as lacklustre in some way. The last few chapters pick up the pace again, though they neither match the opening scenes, nor come close to the final stages in the first novel.Both novels feature a heroine named Campion, with the Campion of this tale being the great-great granddaughter of the former. They are similar in appearance and personality, yet the first Campion appealed to me more.Aspects that make this book lack sparkle is the amount of repetition and the overuse of adjectives. English style often gets overlooked in historical fiction, as most authors in this genre put all their efforts into researching the past. Content and style should complement each other. Quite often a character is described with two or three adjectives when one would’ve sufficed. There’s a point where the character Gitan is introduced as wearing black. This information is followed up by listing all the characters garments, each of which is preceded by the word “black”, thus we have an overflow of adjectives and needless repetition. What particularly annoyed me was the overuse of the phrases, “he/she smiled”, “he/she laughed”. One or both of these are used during almost every character interaction. This stands out more and more as the story progresses, slowing the narrative down, when in most cases the reader can imagine whether a character would smile or laugh by the context of the sentence, like with the following two:>He smiled at her. 'It's going to be all right.'>Her face was frowning. 'But what if he can't unblock the tunnel?'As a rule, if a person tells someone that things will be all right, they say it with a smile. The second sentence is Campion expressing concern, thus it’s obvious what her face is doing. These additions to the dialogue, of which there are many, serve no purpose other than providing an unwanted distraction.I do greatly admire Bernard Cornwell’s authorship, but in every book of his that I’ve read so far his weak point is always dialogue attribution. The dialogue itself is good, but he slows it down, distracting the reader with things like in the sentences above, or telling the reader which character is speaking when it’s obvious who it is.Anyway, despite these minus points, the good parts really are good, thus it just about deserves four stars.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Enjoyable enough as an adventure novel, but the surprise reveal of the villain in the last five pages was unbelievable.
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Bit too much like a romance novel. Expected more from something with Cornwell's name on it.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5So much like Angels and Demons, I am surprised Brown did not get sued over this.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Wow. I expected better. Is it Cornwell or his wife that just doesn't get us to that place we have come to expect from Cornwell. Trite might be a description. Forgetable is probably what I am going to be left with on this one. The period is one of my favorites, it is the dawn of the regency era, when the terror is taking over France. Great we have seen this in before in such works as Dickens, [A Tale of Two Cities], and in the Scarlett Pimpernel.With those classic examples, Cornwell should know that he has do as well as they, or better. He doesn't. We have a little princess of a heroine whose backbone is forced upon us. We have a transparent villian, and we have a hero who really shines as hero only through the mist colored eyes of a romance novel. So what is a novel from one of the premier historical novelists is rally a romance with a thin veneer of historical laced on it.Better has been done elsewhere. Can be skipped.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I bought this book because of the French Revolution background, but the story is so much more than that (in fact, Paris during the revolution barely features, but I was hooked anyway!): romance, a strong heroine, characters who earn the reader's trust and don't deserve it (and vice versa). The involvement of an Illuminati sect, the 'Fallen Angels' is well written, and adds to the darkness and danger of 1790s Paris, but seems rather superfluous to the conclusion. It was fun guessing the identity of Lucifer, the shadowy head of the Fallen Angels, and waiting to have my suspicions confirmed: the author neatly reminds the reader of certain character traits,to aid a mental game of 'Snap!' with the many 'dual personalities' in the book. The historical detail was slightly anachronistic, mainly concerning dance and dress (more Victorian than late Georgian or early Regency), but the descriptions of place and the chivalrous behaviour of the characters was certainly evocative of the time. This is my first taste of Bernard Cornwell - or Susannah Kells, in this case - and I shall certainly try and read the other two stories in this sequence!