The Outlaws of Sherwood

The Outlaws of Sherwood

by Robin McKinley

Narrated by Justine Eyre

Unabridged — 10 hours, 56 minutes

The Outlaws of Sherwood

The Outlaws of Sherwood

by Robin McKinley

Narrated by Justine Eyre

Unabridged — 10 hours, 56 minutes

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Overview

Young Robin Longbow, subapprentice forester in the King's Forest of Nottingham, must contend with the dislike of the Chief Forester, who bullies Robin in memory of his popular father. But Robin does not want to leave Nottingham or lose the title to his father's small tenancy, because he is in love with a young lady named Marian — and keeps remembering that his mother too was gentry and married a common forester.

Robin has been granted a rare holiday to go to the Nottingham Fair, where he will spend the day with his friends Much and Marian. But he is ambushed by a group of the Chief Forester's cronies, who challenge him to an archery contest...and he accidentally kills one of them in self-defense.

He knows his own life is forfeit. But Much and Marian convince him that perhaps his personal catastrophe is also an opportunity: an opportunity for a few stubborn Saxons to gather together in the secret heart of Sherwood Forest and strike back against the arrogance and injustice of the Norman overlords.


Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

McKinley brings to the Robin Hood legend a robustly romantic view. She renders it anew by fully developing the background and motive of each member of the merry band, from Robin's ``crime'' that sends him into the woods, to Marian's subterfuge as she straddles the worlds of the nobility and of the outlaws. Their habitations, foresting and thieving is explained, and McKinley, in a thoughtful afterword, reveals both her debt to and her differences with previous versions of the story. There is no reason, however, that readers of those stories might not enjoy this one as well. Although the author does fall into the politics indigenous only to the British isles, she presents a solid piece of tale-weaving, ingenious and ingenuous, causing readers to suspend belief willingly for a rousing good time. Ages 12-up. (Sept.)

School Library Journal

Gr 9-12 Robin Hood is immortal, but in The Outlaws of Sherwood he doesn't quite come alive. McKinley's novelistic treatment expands the outlines of characters and episodes familiar to readers of Pyle. All is well in the Greenwood until the outlaws open their mouths: their speech and thoughts are a stiff, uneasy mix of ye-olde high seriousness and flip vernacular. McKinley's attempts to evoke the 12th-Century conflict with her wish to raise her characters' political and feminist consciousness do not work. The book moves slowly: there is action, but not enough for the sword-and-sorcery genre addicts; the romance between Robin and Marion hangs fire while he figures out that he can't tell her what to do; the dialogues are sometimes unwieldy and un-yeomanlike; the whole is unconvincing. Pyle's text may be stilted, but there are his wonderful pictures; even Roger Green's version (Penguin, 1984), albeit for a younger audience, has the merit of good pacing. Patricia Dooley, University of Washington, Seattle

From the Publisher

McKinley brings to the Robin Hood legend a robustly romantic view. . . . A solid piece of tale-weaving, ingenious and ingenuous, causing readers to suspend belief willingly for a rousing good time.”—Publishers Weekly

“Readers ready to think beyond stereotypes of glorious violence will find [this] Robin a hero for our times.”—Booklist

“In the tradition of T.H. White’s reincarnation of King Arthur, a novel that brings Robin Hood . . . delightfully to life!”—Kirkus Reviews

Product Details

BN ID: 2940173867018
Publisher: Tantor Audio
Publication date: 10/22/2019
Edition description: Unabridged
Age Range: 8 - 11 Years
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