Cursed: A Netflix Original Series

by Thomas Wheeler

Frank Miller (Illustrator)

Whosoever wields the Sword of Power shall be the one true King.

But what if the Sword has chosen a Queen?

Nimue grew up an outcast. Her connection to dark magic made her something to be feared in her Druid village, and that made her desperate to leave...

That is, until her entire village is slaughtered by Red Paladins, and Nimue's fate is forever altered. Charged by her dying mother to reunite an ancient sword with a legendary sorcerer, Nimue is now her people's only hope. Her mission leaves little room for revenge, but the growing power within her can think of little else.

Nimue teams up with a charming mercenary named Arthur and refugee Fey Folk from across England. She wields a sword meant for the one true king, battling paladins and the armies of a corrupt king. She struggles to unite her people, avenge her family, and discover the truth about her destiny.

But perhaps the one thing that can change Destiny itself is found at the edge of a blade.

Look out for the original Netflix series starring Katherine Langford streaming everywhere Summer 2020!

• ISBN10: 0241376629
• ISBN13: 9780241376621
• Publish Date: 14 May 2020 (first published 1 October 2019)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: GB
• Imprint: Penguin Books Ltd
• Format: Paperback (B-Format (198x129 mm))
• Pages: 448
• Language: English

Reviews

[thepunktheory]

Full book vs. TV show review on my blog coming soon!

Normally, I try to sit down and write my posts in a timely manner after watching the movie/TV show and/or reading the book. However, I just really didn't know what to do with Cursed. It took me forever and 15 days to finally sit down to write this, but here we are!
Overall, I wasn't too impressed with either the book or the Netflix adaptation. But I'm getting ahead of myself. The novel first. This was a weird read and I think I know why. Tom Wheeler, the author, usually writes for TV and film. That shows! Several times throughout the book and especially during the final chapters this felt like a weird in-between of a novel and a script. Neither here nor there. Oftentimes, descriptions or scenes in the chapters were not fleshed out enough and seemed shallow and pale. Something was missing.
On top of that, most of the characters were downright annoying and I just kept rolling my eyes. I wouldn't want to be lead by any of them, especially not Nimue who at times seemed as dense as a brick. Merlin is always drunk and disgusting, and somewhat of a deadbeat. Then we have Uther who is a petulant stupid child. I just wanted to smack him straight across his face. You can see, none of this bodes well for the novel.
I was really looking forward to Frank Miller's art. He provided illustrations for the book but even those were mostly irritating. All in all, things were hard to decipher in his drawings, and every single time I was confused about who he's actually depicting. I could swear the same character looked rather different in each picture.
Long story short, I was very annoyed with the book. I could see a lot of potential but the execution was flawed. However, since the author is a TV writer and many of the chapters felt script-adjacent, I hoped that the adaptation would be better.

[Witty and Sarcastic Bookclub]

Raw and visceral, this book jumps straight into the action and doesn’t let up. This is a new take on the usual Arthurian characters and the changes are creative. Thomas Wheeler strays just enough from the original mythos to create something new, while staying close enough that the characters are still recognizable. Frank Miller adds something different with his illustrations. I should have loved this book. I liked it, but it didn’t end up reaching the “amazing” threshold for me.

The reason it didn’t shoot to the top of my “favorite 2020 books” list happens to be the same reason I’m incredibly excited to see the Netflix show: it’s a very visual book. Each scene was separate and distinct, but they didn’t necessarily flow together into one complete narrative. Instead, they were more like choppy vignettes. This has the potential to make a perfect fantasy show, because the visual scenes will move more naturally into a complete story-line. Plus, the book is chock-full of fight scenes which will be epic, if choreographed well.

The book follows Nimue, although Arthur, Merlin, Morgan, and other Arthurian regulars are also involved. I honestly think Merlin was my favorite character. He usually is, anyway, but what Wheeler did with his character was unique and interesting. I actually got annoyed when the story jumped away from him. Nimue is hardcore in this book, and Morgan is devious, smart, and honestly a wee bit creepy.

Really, the only thing that gave me pause about this book was the choppiness. There were several times where I thought I’d skipped a page by accident because a chapter or paragraph ended so abruptly. It made it difficult to be fully immersed in the story. The bones of the book are brilliant though, and I’m hopeful that the TV show will be fantastic.

This is one of the very rare times where I don’t necessarily recommend reading the book before watching the show. I feel icky writing this, but (gulp!) I think the show has the potential to be better.

https://wittyandsarcasticbookclub.home.blog/2020/06/27/cursed-by-thomas-wheeler-and-frank-miller-book-review-and-thoughts-on-the-show/

[Quirky Cat]

I received a copy of Cursed through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and honest review.

So there’s been a lot of talk about Cursed as of late. And with some very good reasons. For one thing it was written by Thomas Wheeler, and illustrated by Frank Miller (yes, you read that right!). For another thing, Cursed is in the process of being made into a Netflix Original, which is pretty cool.
Cursed is a retelling of some of the events that occurred during King Arthur’s tale. Or more accurately, it’s a twisted version of the tale. In this story, it isn’t a King the Sword desired, but a Queen. Enter Nimue. Her entire village was slaughtered, sending her off on a quest for survival and revenge. And she can only hope that she has it in her to change destiny and save her people.

Cursed was an interesting read, on the whole. It blended the longer form of novel writing with the imagery from the one and only Frank Miller. Together, Miller and Wheeler were clearly trying to do something groundbreaking.
In a world where there are hundreds upon hundreds of King Arthur retellings, Cursed went out of its way to try and be different. And that’s what caught my attention about this series. Or, more accurately, the artistic team caught my attention, but the unique perspective is what held it.
But if I’m being completely honest here – I was pretty let down by the events in Cursed. It was interesting, sure. But it wasn’t anything like the story I expected. Yes, it did follow Nimue and it was an epic quest. But it didn’t hold my attention nearly as much as I hoped.
I really wanted to like Cursed, truly I did. But I found myself struggling to actually get through it all. I kept picking it up and putting it down. Which is never a great sign with me, I’m sad to say. Part of my problem is that the artwork from Frank Miller wasn’t as…brilliant? As I was hoping it would be. The black and white imagery was an interesting choice, and it could have paid off. But I don’t think it was quite there. Not for me, at any rate.
So now I guess the question is: am I interested enough to give the Netflix series a try? Yeah, probably. I’m not sure I’m up for seeing another retelling, but I figure I want to see this through to the end. And I do still hold some higher expectations from the adaptation. I guess I’ll find out!

For more reviews check out Quirky Cat's Fat Stacks