| The Wake | |
| Author: | Paul Kingsnorth |
| Country: | United Kingdom |
| Language: | Anglish |
| Series: | Buckmaster trilogy |
| Genre: | Historical fiction |
| Set In: | The Lincolnshire Fens during the Norman Invasion |
| Publisher: | Unbound Digital |
| Pages: | 384 |
| Awards: |
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| Isbn: | 978-1-908-71786-3 |
The Wake is a 2014 debut novel by British author Paul Kingsnorth.[1] Written in an imaginary language, a hybrid of Old English and Modern English,[2] it tells of Buccmaster of Holland, an Anglo-Saxon freeman forced to come to terms with the effects of the Norman Invasion of 1066, during which his wife and sons were killed.[3] He begins a guerrilla war against the Norman invaders in the Lincolnshire Fens.[4] [5]
Kingsnorth financed the work through crowdfunding on the platform Unbound. After not receiving support through a mainstream publisher, he did not initially expect a large response to his work.[6] However, the book was longlisted for the 2014 Man Booker Prize[7] and won the 2014 Gordon Burn Prize.[8] The film rights were acquired by the actor and director Mark Rylance,[6] [9] who also read a section of the book in 2014 at the Hay Festival.