Essex Dogs

“The Dogs hired their sword-and bows-arms to anyone who paid–in any sort of activity where brute force and sharp steel were needed. That summer the business was war.”

My thanks to W F Howes for a review copy via NetGalley of the unabridged audiobook edition of ‘Essex Dogs’ by Dan Jones. The audiobook is narrated by Ben Miles.

‘Essex Dogs’ is a powerful work of medieval military fiction. While Jones is well known for his historical nonfiction, this is his debut novel. It is the first in his Essex Dogs Trilogy that follows a small tight kit company of soldiers during the Hundred Years’ War.

In July 1346 King Edward III and his lords are on the march through France. Yet this is not a story of kings and nobles but of the men on the ground fighting with swords, axes, and longbows. There are ten Essex Dogs, led by the battle-scarred Loveday FitzTalbot, who just wants to get his men home safely.

This was an extremely violent and earthy novel. There’s no way I could fault the degree of historical detail throughout, though felt that the characters were rather undeveloped. This did improve as the novel progressed and the individual Dogs began to emerge as they faced danger and we were provided snippets of their backstories. By the final chapters I was quite invested in the fates of the survivors.

The King, and Edward, the whiny Prince of Wales, along with the various lords, are quite ghastly in their behaviour towards the French as well as their own men. Thankfully, there is only one woman featured in the narrative. I say thankfully given the setting. I felt that Jones was sensitive to this, only referencing what had happened to her ‘off page’ rather than describing.

With respect to the audiobook, I applaud the casting of British actor, Ben Miles. His narration was superb, bringing a power and gravitas to the reading. Indeed, he brought the characters vividly to life from the soldiers slogging through the mud to those entitled, squabbling royals and nobles. It is a novel that I felt was well suited to the audiobook format.

Overall, ‘Essex Dogs’ impressed me from the outset for its meticulously detailed, raw depiction of this medieval war from the perspective of those with their boots on the ground: a 14th Century Band of Brothers. While it took longer for my emotions to become engaged, I became invested and certainly plan to read the upcoming books when published.

Highly recommended.

4.5 stars rounded up to 5.

I’ve enjoyed a few non fiction titles by Dan Jones. His style is clear and concise and I was interested to see how he’d tackle historical fiction. The audio version is superbly narrated throughout with each character given a distinctive voice. I thoroughly enjoyed listening to it.

The tale involves a group of paid soldiers, the Essex Dogs. They’re a mixed bunch of individuals; a Scot, a couple of Welshmen and others, banded together for some weeks to help King Edward invade France. They want to do the job and get home. Although a work of fiction, each chapter is built around actual events and progress. Many of the Earls are real and their characters have substance, The detail is vivid and although the story starts slowly, I felt as if I was on a journey with this little band of men, They have their own ways, the Welshman don’t speak English, there’s humour, brutality and a real sense of what fighting was like in the mid 1200s. It’s an adventure and I felt Dan Jones has really captured the brutality, camaraderie, class differences, loyalties and conflicts to perfection. A brilliant new voice in historical fiction and I hope they’ll be more.

My thanks to the publisher for a review copy via Netgalley.