With the release of a new title in The Last King series, The Last Alliance, I thought it time to address the ‘elephant’ in the room – all that d*** swearing, and not just swearing, but the heavy almost grotesque use of one particular swear word which some will bend over backwards to assure you was used no earlier than the sixteenth century (in the written records), 700 years after the books are set. (Check out Holy Sh*t by Melissa Mohr for a history of swearing.)
I’m not writing in Old English
Well, first things first, lovely people, aside from the names of the characters in these books, and perhaps the word ‘witan,’ every word in these books is modern-English. I’ve not attempted to have my characters sound ‘ye olde worldy’ and that was very intentional. Although, it seems, that s*** is, indeed, Old English. So, forget that, there is another word in there that is also Old English. (Check out the will of King Alfred, and Eadred for some Old English https://blogs.bl.uk/digitisedmanuscripts/2013/07/the-last-will-and-testament-of-alfred-the-great.html)
The UK/US divide around swearing
I wanted my characters to swear. There, I’ve said it. I wanted them to swear and to shock with their language, but I also wanted them to sound like people today. Not everyone swears, admittedly, but most people do. In the UK, we have no problem with the F-word, although US audiences are horrified by it. In the UK, we don’t like the C-word, which in the US, is just fine and dandy – apparently. We swear and we curse and we’re not even (most of us) fighting for our lives against a deadly enemy, which my characters are forced to do.
Am I a potty-mouth?
I’ve had reviewers decry the swearing. I’ve even had reviewers decide the swearing in the books is because I somehow lack the intelligence to write a novel without swearing. Perhaps, most amusingly, a close friend was astounded by the language in the books – I am not, it seems, a potty-mouth in ‘real life’ (although, I can be pushed to it).
‘Oh dear me, that smarts.’
My characters face a life-and-death situation almost every day of their lives. I don’t think they’ll be sitting there saying, ‘oh dear me, that smarts,’ when they’re wounded, or even, ‘oh goodness me, I’ve killed that man.’ They are lethal, bloody and violent, and for all that, they are very relatable to a modern-audience perhaps struggling to truly comprehend what life ‘might’ have been like in Saxon England as the Viking raiders threatened the safety of all.
There are Cleaner Version
That said, I have no intention of forcing people to cast the books aside if they don’t like the swearing. There are also ‘Cleaner Versions‘, without much of the foul language. It tones it down a little, but the violence is not diminished.
Enjoy the fast-paced action
So, whether you love the swearing or not, you can still enjoy the tales of Coelwulf II, and book 9, The Last Alliance is available now in ebook, paperback, hardback and the Cleaner Version on kindle as well. And remember, allowing my characters to swear was done purposefully, indeed, on initial feedback, I actually added a lot more:)
MJ Porter 