The story covers nearly 20 years as the brothers and the people of Ratharryn struggle to survive as a tribe, fighting harsh weather and starvation, warring with other tribes and trying to appease their angry gods. The youngest sibling, Saban, will ultimately construct the temple, but not until he has endured torture, slavery and betrayal. As a warrior and tyrant, his brutality is second only to that of his crippled brother, Camaban, a sorcerer ruthlessly determined to have a massive stone temple erected to honor his authority. Lengar, the eldest, murders his own father to become the chief of his tribe. It features three brothers linked by blood but divided by madness, jealousy and lust for power.

This wild tale, rich with sorcery, pagan ritual, greed and intrigue, is Cornwell's most ambitious fiction yet. Now he imaginatively unlocks the mystery of Stonehenge's creation in 2000 B.C., at the beginning of Britain's Bronze Age. Tolkien than of David Macaulay.Prolific British author Cornwell is best known for his Napoleonic warfare adventure series with Captain Richard Sharpe, and for the Starbuck Chronicles, about the American Civil War.

In the end, the book is more likely to appeal to fans of J. The historical note that closes the book attests to Cornwell's concern with getting the details right, but his chief interest seems to lie in borrowing these details for a fantastic story of intertribal rivalries, Machiavellian scheming by rival sect leaders and fierce battles over talismans. Cornwell's depictions of the herculean efforts needed to move, shape and raise the stones of Stonehenge sound plausible, and his portrayal of the vitality and brutality of a society slowly creeping toward civilization is deft. To Saban falls the unenviable task of building the temple that Lengar believes will make him invincible in battle and that Camaban believes will unite the solar and lunar deities and thus eliminate winter along with other causes of suffering in the world. At the story's center are three brothers: Lengar, a warrior who takes the leadership of his tribe through patricide Camaban, a crippled outcast who transforms himself into a sorcerer and seizes power from Lengar and Saban, a craftsman who longs for the peaceful days of his father's reign. Combining informed conjecture with the story of a savage family whose treachery makes the Sopranos look tame by comparison, Bernard Cornwell has written a diverting novel that imagines the history behind Stonehenge.

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