Erika's Reviews > Tuck

I’m not sure where to start with this review since I didn’t make time in the past couple of years to review Hood and Scarlet, but the only reason I kept reading this trilogy was because of Robin Hood.

I love Robin Hood and I love this series. I don’t love the writing of these books. Except, there’s something that kept me reading and that was the need to get to the end and find out if this version has a happy ending.

I don’t want to ruin it or anything, but, it does.

Lawhead includes a pronunciation guide with each book that’s either useless, addicting (me), or frustrating, depending on your sensibilities. In his version of events, Robin Hood is really Bran ap Brychan, wayward Welsh prince of Elfael (pronounced Evile). If you’ve read as far as Tuck (and even if you haven’t, I’ll spoil it anyway), then you know Bran’s a bit of an orphan. With his father dead, Bran has become king, but Evil King William II (son of The Conqueror) has reneged on his promise to restore Bran to his rightful throne. Bran’s land and people are overseen by a nasty Bishop, Sheriff (Glanville, not Nottingham), and Marshal Guy de Gysburne; Robin’s band of Merry Men--Will Scatlocke (Scarlet), Iwan (Little John), Brother Aethelfrith (Friar Tuck), Mérian, Alan a’Dale, and many others--manage to push their luck and best them at every encounter.

If the historical cast of characters seems almost familiar it’s because they’re almost the same as the typical Robin Hood interpretation, but not quite. Lawhead has created an 11th century historical context for the reality that could possibly have been the real Robin Hood, or, Rhi Bran y Hud (King Raven the Enchanter). And to give the appropriate mythos to his recreation, Lawhead wove Celtic mythology (King Raven) and even Celtic vocabulary to make his story even more believable.

Tuck is broken up into 5 parts and an epilogue, each preceded (except the epilogue) by a set of stanzas from a really catchy poem that reads a lot like Middle English and nothing like the style Lawhead has used for rest of the narrative. I flipped through the front and back pages trying to find out if he had taken this from someone else and I was just missing the citation, but I didn’t find it. The writing style was lyrical and rhythmic with rhymes and catchy lines--really lively and wonderfully light. In short, it was nothing at all like the halting, awkward dialogue I think Lawhead meant to be archaic, but that came out too purple when it wasn’t truly funny or touching. Unfortunately, the real moments are few despite the obvious amount of work and research that went into this trilogy.

I was never really sure in what direction Lawhead wanted his audience to go with these books. There are times, like certain deaths or climatic events, that are strangled of emotion and left me dismissing the situations with the same care Lawhead attended to his writing in these moments. At times funny, the narrative was also adventurous, but the elements never quite came together in a unison that would have spun this novel (and the other two) out of it’s element and into something much, much greater. It’s not too much to ask for a dynamic, unhurried myth that is as much adventure as it is a tale of human triumph and tragedy. But I don’t think Tuck and the King Raven Trilogy in general were meant to be anything more than an entertaining Fantasy read with a strong historical context for the casual reader to become engrossed in the would-be reality of a familiar myth.

The plot, always, was fascinating and streamlined enough that I forgot the awkwardness of the writing that sometimes threatened to take over the tone of events. Even though I wasn’t excited about Lawhead’s writing, I really did love these books, and Tuck in particular; our mythical heroes are finally together, shooting arrows from out of the green towards unsuspecting evil-doers like the Sheriff and his cronies.

In this final installment, Bran and the Grellon (the folk he protects) are dejected and walking back to their forest sanctuary. King William II has just gone back on his promise leaving Bran the king of a ragtag band of survivors and refugees, the overload of a patch of forest surrounded by clever woodland lures and traps. His people are tired of unfulfilled promises and some would rather take their chances under the direct rule of William’s men than suffer further disappointments following the hopeful and frustrated dreamer, Rhi Bran ap Brychan. Sure that his mission would be better served by staunch supporters and true believers, Bran allows those who want to leave go without reservation. Now halved in their numbers, Rhi Bran decides to travel north and ask for the help of his mother’s relatives despite Mérian’s suggestions to seek the aid of her father (within a day’s riding distance) and the armies at his disposal.

And there is where the plot begins. Mérian goes to see her father by herself while Bran discovers his minor royal cousin, Gryffydd King of Gwenydd, has been jailed by another monarch and to even barter for the support of his extended family, Gryffydd (Griffith) must be rescued. Add to this roadblock Mérian’s imprisonment by her brother who now presides over their dead father’s realm and disbelieves his sister’s accusations of kidnap at the hand of his in-laws. Rhi Bran’s got quite a mess on his hands if ever he wants to bring peace to his Cymry home, but it involves a manhunt, a pack of wily mongrels, a sin-obsessed King, and whole lot of hand-crafted arrows.

Stephen Lawhead has added a unique perspective on the Robin Hood myth. After reading the entire trilogy, I can’t imagine the mythos without this concrete historical context. I don’t believe Lawhead’s interpretation is the only and penultimate translation of myth-to-man version of Robin Hood, but, true to the belief of Thomas a’Dale, grandson of Alan a’Dale:

“so long as the singer took care to adapt it to his listeners: dropping in names of the local worthies, the places nearby that local folk knew, any particular features of the countryside and its people--it all helped to create a sense of instant recognition for those he entertained, and flattered his patrons.”
Stephen Lawhead, Tuck, hardcover first edition, p. 432.

And there, at the end of Lawhead’s Robin Hood, the legend of the freedom fighter rises beyond the words of this novel, of this series, and meets the ghosts of Nottingham, Prince John, and Sherwood Forest--one adaptation among many, but the one we recognize the most and can therefore finally connect to Lawhead’s Rhi Bran y Hud, King Bran the Enchanter.

PS For those of you into that kind of thing, Lawhead responds to hand-written letters and is a very, very kind man. :)