The Fall of the Grand Sarrasin / Being a Chronicle of Sir Nigel de Bessin, Knight, of Things that Happed in Guernsey Island, in the Norman Seas, in and about the Year One Thousand and Fifty-Seven

A young Norman raised by island monks narrates his transition from cloister to soldier amid incursions by Saracen pirates who burn the abbey and besiege the castle. He sounds the alarm, fights in local engagements, and is dispatched to seek aid from Duke William, suffering capture, imprisonment, and escape along the way. With help from Norman allies a relief expedition is mounted, battles are fought on rocky shores and in a glen, and the pirate leader is slain and unmasked. The account ends with the narrator restored to his family and reflecting on the mixture of courage, faith, violence, and loyalty that shaped his youth.