It’s been ten years since the conclusion of the Magicians trilogy and over fifty years since the last major reimagining of King Arthur. Now, one of our most acclaimed literary fantasy writers is taking up the sword, and he’s written a tale that makes Arthur urgent, exciting, and timely again. His story has been told and retold for more than 1,400 years, always becoming a mirror for the world it’s being told to and a lens for examining the contemporary moment. When Grossman began writing, he asked himself: What would an Arthur for this millennium look like? What would we learn about him, and what could he tell us about the world we live in now? The result is THE BRIGHT SWORD, a triumphant and richly imagined tale – one that’s both steeped in tradition and sheds fresh light on a much-beloved piece of popular culture. THE BRIGHT SWORD begins with a gifted young knight named Collum, who’s headed to Camelot to compete for a spot on the Round Table – only to discover that he’s too late. Arthur is dead, and only a handful of the knights of the Round Table survive. And they aren’t the heroes of legend, like Lancelot or Gawain. They’re the oddballs, from the edges of the stories, like Sir Palomides, the Saracen Knight, and Sir Dagonet, Arthur’s fool, who was knighted as a joke. They’re joined by Nimue, who was Merlin’s apprentice until she turned on him and buried him under a hill. Together this ragtag fellowship will set out to rebuild Camelot in a world that has lost its balance. But Arthur’s death has revealed Britain’s fault lines. God has abandoned it, and the fairies and monsters and old gods are returning, led by Arthur’s half-sister Morgan le Fay. Kingdoms are turning on each other, Camelot is under attack, and rival factions are forming around the disgraced Lancelot and the fallen Queen Guinevere. It is up to Collum and his companions to reclaim Excalibur, solve the mysteries of this ruined world, and make it whole again. But before they can restore Camelot they’ll have to learn the truth of why the lonely, brilliant King Arthur fell, and lay to rest the ghosts of his troubled family and of Britain’s dark past. ABOUT THE AUTHOR Lev Grossman is the author of the #1 New York Times bestselling Magicians trilogy—The Magicians, The Magician King, and The Magician’s Land—which has been published in thirty countries and adapted as a TV show that ran for five seasons on SYFY. He is also a screenwriter and the author of two children’s books, The Golden Swift and The Silver Arrow, and his journalism has appeared in Time, Vanity Fair, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, among many other places. He lives with his wife and children in New York City.