Dayla Learning

Summary: 

A gifted young knight named Collum arrives at Camelot to compete for a spot on the Round Table, only to find he’s too late. The king died two weeks ago at the Battle of Camlann, leaving no heir, and only a handful of the knights of the Round Table survive.

They aren’t the heroes of legend, like Lancelot or Gawain. They’re the oddballs of the Round Tables, from the edges of the stories, like Sir Palomides, the Saracen Knight and Sir Dagonet, Arthur’s fool, who was knighted as a joke. They’re joined by Nimue, who was Merlin’s apprentice until she turned on him and buried him under a hill. Together this ragtag fellowship will set out to rebuild Camelot in a world that has lost its balance.

But Arthur’s death has revealed Britain’s fault lines. God has abandoned it, and the fairies and monsters and old gods are returning, led by Arthur’s half-sister Morgan le Fay. Kingdoms are turning on each other, warlords are laying siege to Camelot, and rival factions are forming around the disgraced Lancelot and the fallen Queen Guinevere. It is up to Collum and his companions to reclaim Excalibur, solve the mysteries of this ruined world and make it whole again. But before they can restore Camelot they’ll have to learn the truth of why the lonely, brilliant King Arthur fell and lay to rest the ghosts of his troubled family and of Britain’s dark past. (Goodreads summary)

Instructor Note: 

Arthurian retellings abound, and they continue to captivate us with timeless themes of honor, loyalty, love, betrayal, fate, and virtue. This new offering is written with deep love for the original inspirations as well as honest about the limited perspectives in those. It celebrates the ones cast aside, who were misfits, scorned, deemed inadequate or imperfect, and highlights their stories as they both uphold and deconstruct the ideals of the Round Table. 

The author writes a multilayered story that resembles the structure of core inspirational texts like Le Morte d’Arthur – a collection of stories that give background on each knight – while weaving in a plot about what happened after Arthur and the Round Table fell. Through it, we learn about each of the characters – their common interpretations along with a modern vision for how they could have been erased. 

While some background in Arthurian stories is recommended, a fresh reader could start with this then work back through other retellings.