"A Really Good Read!"
"A Really Good Read"
"The Folkungs was the highlight of my summer reading! A wonderful saga combining love, struggle, intrigue, ambition and power. The characters become your best friends! I found the book difficult to put down at times and I gleaned so much Scandinavian history from its pages. I can't imagine the amount of research involved in order to write a book so well. It would make a fabulous movie!! A "must read" at the top of your list!"
"I loved this book from the first page. It’s a fascinating account of an extraordinary time in Swedish history. The story is fast moving and gripping. The characters are beautifully developed and completely relatable despite being set in the 14th century. I read it with my 13 year old son who was also entranced. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was picked up as a screenplay."'
"This book is a fascinating history of medieval Swedish monarchy, focusing on the 14th century. The Sweden it describes is unrecognizable in today's Sweden, and actually duplicates monarchial histories in other countries of the era with its mix of power, ambition, bloodthirstiness and sheer humanity. But it also shows how Sweden attempted to strike bargains with other local kingdoms to bring and maintain peace in the Scandinavian peninsula, thus presaging modern day efforts in Europe writ large. Many lessons to be learned here. The book itself is well-written and deeply researched, but ultimately has many fictional elements in it both to enhance drama and to fill in historical gaps."
The tale offers us a journey into a medieval Scandinavian dynasty, filled with love, lust, wars and royal crimes — The Folkungs. This riveting epic draws from the myths and history every child in Sweden comes to learn, transformed into an adult-themed power struggle that takes place within Sweden and spreads to the neighboring countries.
It begins at Nykoping Castle, Sweden, 1291. King Magnus is dead, and his three young sons — Birger (eleven), Erik (nine), and Valdemar (eight) — await the arrival of the appointed Regent of Sweden, a powerful noble and celebrated warrior, who will teach them the arts of governing, knighthood and skills of war until the young king, Birger, comes of age. Under his tutelage, Erik, the middle child, will show himself to be the most intelligent and skillful of the three; Valdemar, the youngest, will look on in admiration, while the fledgling King will bridle with jealousy.
Arriving with the Regent is his nine-year-old daughter, Kristina, who stares aghast at the royal fortress rising before her like a grim symbol of doom. Her fear is well-founded: here wastes away a King usurped and imprisoned by his brother, where the future holds even darker treachery.
Kristina, all innocence, is entering a world where personal desires are sacrificed to political necessity. Marriage is about forging international alliances, so Birger, King of Sweden, will marry Princess Marta of Denmark;
the King of Denmark will marry Princess Ingeborg of Sweden, while Dukes Valdemar and Erik will marry a Norwegian princess or a princess from one of the German principalities. Kristina cannot but wonder what her own future will hold. As the young princes mature, King Birger proves himself to be increasingly inept and manipulated by the self-seeking Regent. He accuses his innocent brothers of treachery and wages war against them as punishment, wreaking unnecessary bloodshed on the land. For Erik, this is intolerable. Can Sweden be left prey to his brother's weak rule? Alliances are formed across the borders as the royals start taking sides.
Sweden’s royal family — is a generational saga interwoven with jealousy, conspiracy, rivalry, treason, regicide, exorcism, paganism, torture, witchcraft, shamanism, falconry, folklore, power struggles, and deeply touching love stories. Author M.E. Javits's words are brought to life across the snowy landscapes, light summer nights, and medieval castles of Scandinavia, and readers across the nation have fallen in love with her characters, plot, and themes.
Order your copy of The Folkungs by M.E. Javits today.