How I Came to Write Boru: Forging a King: An Epic Novel of Viking Age Ireland
The first history book I read, as a young boy, was Peter Green’s biography of Alexander the Great. I was captivated by the story of his life and his deeds, and it never left me. I still believe the greatest stories ever told are the ones that actually happened.
Growing up in Ireland, I always had an interest in Irish history, but early medieval Ireland felt like a gap. In my own knowledge, and in the wider culture. Most people, Irish included, know surprisingly little about what this island looked like before the Normans and the English arrived. The political complexity. The kingdoms. The Norse towns. What people wore, how they were governed, the laws and the wars. It is such an interesting period, and it gets far less attention than I feel it deserves.
Part of what keeps people away, I think, is that they are put off by history books. They equate them with stuffy history classes in school. There is superb academic history on early medieval Ireland, and I read a good deal of it, but plenty of ordinary readers find the prospect daunting. Too dense, too detailed, too many names and dates. I wanted to write something for those readers. A story first, built on historical fact, that would hold someone for three or four hundred pages and leave them knowing a lot more about Irish history and culture than when they started. Hopefully it sparks a broader interest in some of them, so they may want to learn more and even pick up a few of those history books.
Reasons I Wrote the Book
There were two other reasons I wrote the book.
The first was that I wanted to find out if I could actually do it. I had never written a novel. I had never published anything before. I wanted to take the whole thing from a blank page to a finished book with my name on the cover, because I did not know whether I could.
The second was that I felt, like so many people, I was wasting my evenings. Television, my phone, games, scrolling for hours and then not being able to tell you one thing I had looked at. I decided to challenge myself with something that would be a more productive use of my time.
Brian Boru
Brian Boru was the obvious place to start. His story has everything. Tragedy, ambition, war, loss, and a trajectory that took a minor prince from a small kingdom in modern County Clare to High King of Ireland. Like Alexander, he was a force of nature. Unlike Alexander, he is largely unknown outside Ireland, and even here he is more legend than man. Most people can tell you he defeated the Vikings at Clontarf, but beyond that their knowledge is incredibly vague. They know little, if anything, of Brian’s remarkable life or what Ireland was actually like at the time. His story has been told before, but I thought a fresh attempt at it would be worth making for a modern audience.
I started with reading. Seán Duffy’s Brian Boru and the Battle of Clontarf was my favourite, and I went back to it many times. Morgan Llywelyn’s 1014 was another, along with the annals themselves and a stack of others.
Then I built a timeline, and that turned out to be the most useful work I did on the book. Every event, every character, every date, every death and battle and submission, laid out in order, so the story I put on top could not drift from what actually happened. Only when the timeline and arc were solid did I start writing scenes.
Loving Writing
The writing itself I loved, which surprised me. I had expected a slog, and instead I looked forward to getting out to it in the evenings. To write a scene, you have to be in the place. You have to know what the weather is doing, what the ground is like underfoot, who is in the scene, what they are wearing, what they are thinking. Holding all of that in your head for an evening takes you out of your own life entirely. I found it very relaxing. The more I wrote, the more I believed I could finish it, and the more I wanted to write.
When the first draft was done, I remember thinking, well, that is nearly it. All that is left is to format it and put it out. How hard can that be?
I was walking into a second learning curve, and a long one. Editing. Cover design. Front and back matter. Formatting an interior that does not look homemade. Metadata, categories, pricing, ISBNs. Building an audience from nothing so somebody is actually there on the day the book goes live. A hundred other things I had never heard of six months earlier. But like anything challenging, you learn from it, and you feel a real sense of achievement when it is done.
My First Novel
This is my first novel. Overall, I am very happy with how it turned out, and I can already see plenty I want to improve in the next one. That was the other thing I did not know in advance: whether I would get to the end and just be glad it was over, with no appetite to write another. I can say for certain that is not the case. I am looking forward to throwing myself into the challenge of the next book and improving as a writer. BORU: Forging a King takes Brian to 978. The second book takes him from there to Clontarf in 1014, and I am looking forward to writing it.
It was a long, hard road, but very rewarding and worth doing. If there is one thing I would like readers to take from this, it is to challenge yourself and do the thing you love but have been afraid to start. You will be surprised by what you can achieve when you put your mind to it.
BORU: Forging a King is available worldwide now. I hope you enjoy it.
(c) Barra Ó Murchú
About BORU: Forging a King
IRELAND, 10th CENTURY.
Fractured by blood feuds and rival kings, the island bleeds under the Viking axe. Along the River Shannon, Norse longships bring fire and slavery to the south. In the shattered kingdom of Munster, one man refuses to break.
Brian Boru wants vengeance, not a crown. Outnumbered and hunted, he wages a brutal guerrilla war from the dense forests of Thomond. But a bloodied sword cannot heal a broken land. To crush the Northmen, Brian must conquer his own countrymen first.
Witness the rise of Ireland’s greatest king through the eyes of the allies who bled for him, and the tyrants who tried to break him. The chronicle begins here.
Order your copy of BORU: Forging a King online here.
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