Bernard Cornwell (b. 1944)
Filed under the name Bernard · March 21, 2026
Bernard Cornwell writes those Sharpe books, the historical fiction ones, and I'll tell you, I had a student back in my third-grade days — no, not reading Sharpe at eight years old, don't be silly, but a boy named Petey who grew up and became the reader of the family, and I think of him every time somebody makes a whole career out of good, solid storytelling like Mr. Cornwell has. Seems like he's spent a good long while writing history dressed up as adventure, and there's nothing wrong with that, not one thing. I read more Westerns and Hallmark than war novels myself, but I respect a man who can hold a reader's attention across that many books, that many years. My grandkids tell me some of what passes for a story nowadays doesn't have a beginning, middle, or end you can follow, and I believe them. A storyteller who can keep folks turning pages for decades is doing something old-fashioned and right. That's a lesson worth remembering: good bones in a story never go out of style.