Rhythmic and rippling and periphrastic

‘So what is Spear? Well, Hild, but with magic – Hild let off the leash, unbound by those pesky historical constraints – and set a hundred years earlier, in Wales rather than England. The setting is throughly Celtic-flavoured, and so is the language: instead of spear-straight English I aimed for prose that’s rhythmic and rippling and periphrastic. Arthur’s/Arturus’s Companions (Fighters Previously Known as the Knights of the Round Table) are much more various than the myth, the grail is very much not what it seems, and Caer Leon/Camelot is queered six ways from Sunday. In many ways, though, all that is peripheral. What takes centre stage is the journey of Percival/Peretur, a girl and then young woman who leaves home to find out who she is. Climate change and other real-world events are there as underpinnings – you won’t notice unless you’re looking – but essentially thwis is a Hero’s Journey, or, more accurately, a Heroine’s Real Hero’s Journey. All Heroes set out to win, and Peretur is no exception, but winning for her is not just about the slaying of monsters – which she most definitely does (both human and otherwise), and with great élan – but about connecting: finding her people and a place to belong. In many ways this book is a kind of homecoming – not just for Peretur but for me: a coming-together of two parts of my career.’

— Nicola Griffith on her novel Spear’