'A masterpiece' - Chicago Tribune 'King Arthur is a living presence who moves in a brilliantly lit and fantastic landscape... Rosemary Sutcliff is a spellbinder' - New York Times 'Rosemary Sutcliff was the first, the greatest and the best. She showed the rest of it how it was done with her Roman fiction, but it's with Arthur that she came into her own. Her novel, Sword at Sunset is simply the best evocation of the Arthurian myth ever to grace the page. It's impossible to read it and not to be blown away by the power and clarity of the narrative, by its sheer grounded elegance, by the wonder of the time, by the sense that this is the living Arthur and everything else is a pale shadow. Her writing shines with a lucidity and beauty that seers the mind. I defy you to read this and not to be able to smell the moors, taste the wind, feel the power of the horse warriors, and weep at the doomed king.' MC Scott

Rosemary Sutcliff wrote more than 40 historical novels for young adults - including the classics The Eagle of the Ninth, The Silver Branch, The Lantern Bearers, The Sword and the Circle and Black Ships Before Troy. She died in 1992.