Dear Bernard,

First of all I am looking forward with great expectations to your new book The Pagan Lord, I hope, and indeed fully expect, it to live up to be an amazing tale. Based on your previous books am sure this will be the case anyway, no doubt.
However I was curious as to how far into the future Uhtred will live, I always presumed that when the lords of Bebbanburg submitted to Athelstan, that would be when Uhtred would gain Bebbanburg back, and I also presumed he would have some kind of hand in the battle of Brunanburh as well before he died. I was sure this would be the case however when I looked at the brief description of your new book it lets us know that Uhtred would be going home to try and capture Bebbanburg, so I was slightly confused, however I am sure that I will find out when I read it.
However this got me thinking, that as Uhtred has to die at some point, then would that be where the Saxon Stories would end. I was curious because I would love to read your take on events after this time, for example the invasion of Cnut the Great. Possibly leading up to all the way up to the Battle of Hastings and the norman invasion. This would be my absolute dream. To have a series written all the way through from Alfred to William 1 would be fantastic, particularly if it was written by an author such as yourself. I do realise that you probably have other books you wish to write as well, and a complete novelisation of the years form Alfred to William would take an enormous amount of time, however I was simply curious about if you had thought that far into the future.
There is also one more thing I would like to ask you about, you said in your books that you treat Athelred a bit unfairly. I thought this the first time I read them, Athelred as far as I knew he was an effective ruler who worked well with Alfred and Edward. So I was curious as to why you have depicted Athelred in this way, was is to create animosity between him and Uhtred, or possibly to give Athelflaed an obvious reason to grow close Uhtred over time.

Kind Regards, and thanks for all the reading pleasure.