The Paradise War
core novel 1991 Song of Albion
Record
| First published | 1991 |
|---|---|
| Original language |  EN |
| Work type | novel |
| Canon status | core |
| Reader rating | 4.06 (10,784 ratings, collected 2026-08-21) |
| Page count | 444 |
| First-edition ISBN | 9780310217923 |
Synopsis
The Paradise War opens with American graduate student Lewis Gillies and his roommate Simon Rawnson investigating reports of an aurochs, an extinct wild ox, sighted in the Scottish highlands. While the two search the area, Simon vanishes into an ancient cairn and crosses into Albion, an otherworldly realm rooted in Celtic myth and inhabited by the Tuatha de Danann. Lewis follows him through the same passage and finds himself transformed and drawn into Albion's affairs just as Cythrawl, a great evil bound within that world, begins to stir. Separated from the familiar world he knew, Lewis must adapt to Albion's customs and dangers as the looming threat draws him and Simon into a struggle whose scale neither of them anticipated when they set out to track a legendary animal.
Where it sits
- Universe: Song of Albion
- Series: Song of Albion core; position 1 of 3 in the series' recorded order
- Author: Stephen R. Lawhead
Notes
- From the series record (Song of Albion): Complete trilogy blending a modern-day protagonist with Celtic otherworld myth; in continuous print for over two decades.
Neighbouring works
Publication order and internal chronology are tracked as two separate orderings and are never conflated: a book's place in one says nothing about its place in the other.
- Publication order, within the series Song of Albion: position 1 of 3: next The Silver Hand (1992)
Sources
← Song of Albion dossier · All universes
Part of the Library. Fields without an identified source are omitted, never guessed.