US: Hardcover, ebook, digital audio available 3 October, 2023 UK: Digital audio and ebook 3 October, hardcover from 21 November, 2023
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PRAISE FOR MENEWOOD AND HILD“[A] masterpiece of immersion… Reading Menewood is like opening a door and stepping into another world, one that’s cool and wet, green and gray, full of birds and trees, valleys and hilltops, rivers and seas. There’s dreadful violence, yes, and hunger, profound loss; there’s wearying work, but also bristling energy, fierce joy. There’s Hild, still, at the heart of it all, figuring herself out in the vast and rippling pattern around her.” — Amal El-Mohtar, New York Times
“Redemptive, absorbing, and deeply satisfying.” — Constance Grady, Vox
“Griffith has published only a handful of novels, but each of them has been in some way extraordinary. She writes with a clarity of expression, precision, and force that few writers of my experience can equal … There are lines and paragraphs that will haunt me for years. Griffith has an incredible talent … I deeply admire this book.” — Liz Bourke, Tor.com
“Density of detail, political complexity, and brilliance of characterization…this may be the major work so far of a major talent.” — Gary Wolfe, Locus
“Griffith follows up Hild with a transportive second volume” — Publishers Weekly
“Menewood is a searing depiction of a world at war, and the ferocious and complicated woman at the center of it.” — Maria Dahvana Headley
“Hild was unexpected and beautiful…Menewood is an even more stunning sequel … You leave somewhat dazed and dazzled…beauty and crystal clarity makes it an incredibly immersive world to inhabit. It is a book about a strange, singular woman, and her view on the world around her, and it is a marvel.” — Roseanna Pendlebury, Nerds of a Feather
“Menewood is an absolute triumph. Hild is truly a hero for all women, here and now.” — Carolyne Larrington, Professor of Medieval European Literature, University of Oxford
“Lush, textured—another gem of a book.” — Misha Grifka Wander, Ancillary Review
“In it’s ambition and intelligence, Hild might best be compared to Hilary Mantel’s novels about Thomas Cromwell.” — Bookforum
“A magnificent and convincing portrayal of a strange, wild, beautiful world.” — Guardian
“Vivid, richly detailed…a powerful, clever novel. Griffith illuminates the so-called Dark Ages, reconstructing an often alien historical world with great precision.” — BBC History Magazine
“Hild is a book as loving as it is fierce, brilliant and accomplished. To read it felt like a privilege and a gift.” — NPR
“…dazzling… Griffith’s lyrical prose emphasizes the savagery of the political landscape, in which religion, sex, and superstition are wielded mercilessly for personal gain.” — Paris Review Daily
“The novel resonates to many of the same chords as Beowulf, the legends of King Arthur, Lord of the Rings, and Game of Thrones—to the extent that Hild begins to feel like the classic on which those books are based.” — Neal Stephenson
“What a fabulous book! I fell into this world completely and was sorry to come out. Truly, truly remarkable.” — Karen Joy Fowler
PLOT (FROM THE PUBLISHER):In the much anticipated return to the world of Hild, Nicola Griffith’s Menewood transports readers back to seventh-century Britain, a land of rival kings and religions poised for epochal change.
Hild is no longer the bright child who made a place in Edwin Overking’s court with her seemingly supernatural insight. She is eighteen, honed and tested, the formidable Lady of Elmet, now building her personal stronghold in the valley of Menewood.
But Edwin needs his most trusted advisor. Old alliances are fraying. Younger rivals are snapping at his heels. War is brewing―bitter war, winter war. Not knowing who to trust he becomes volatile and unpredictable. Hild begins to understand the true extent of the chaos ahead, and now she must navigate the turbulence and fight to protect both the kingdom and her own people.
Hild will face the losses and devastation of total war, and then she must find a new strength, the implacable determination to forge a radically different path for herself and her people. In the valley, her last redoubt, her community slowly takes root. She trains herself and her unexpected allies in new ways of thinking as she prepares for one last wager: risking all on a single throw for a better future…
In the last decade, Hild has become a beloved classic of epic storytelling. Menewood picks up where that journey left off, and exceeds it in every way
FEELS (FROM THE AUTHOR)Menewood begins four months after the end of Hild, and covers less than four years of Hild’s life, but those years are some of the most tumultuous in Northern British history: epic and intense, full of the extremes of war. (If you imagine it as a trilogy in one volume you might get a sense of what to expect.) Hild experiences almost every emotion a person can—love and lust, war and victory, grief and loss, belonging and savage joy—all while guiding others past their own fear and ambition. Through it all she grows and changes, coming to truly understand power and how to make, break, and shape kings.
Menewood is also full of quieter moments: peace, pleasure, contentment; forgiveness, friendship, and farewells. It is a book about life—how it feels, what it means, why it changes—set against the backdrop of total war and regime change.
If Hild was about a child relying on her agile mind and acute observations of nature and human behaviour to stay one step ahead of the whims of a volatile king, then Menewood revolves around a young woman becoming herself—learning to live life on her own terms; to build, hold, and wield power—exploring and really inhabiting who she is.
Above all, Menewood is about Hild. She is on every page, the burning heart around which events turn. And, just as in the first book, Hild is most at home in nature, so the book is full of water, sky, and high wild places. I can’t wait for you to read it.
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