The year is 961 and King Harald Bluetooth of Denmark has his gaze firmly set on the Western Kingdoms of Norway where his nephew Harald Greycloak reigns. Bluetooth has declared Greycloak as his vassal King of Norway and will claim the establishment of the Jomsvikings. In doing so he will solidify the order, building a keep for the warriors he intends to use to create a fleet of men who will rule the seas under his command. However, the order is older than one man's claim and consists of many who have their own destinies separate from the feuding monarchs. There are men of honour and worth and there are those who seek naught but power and privilege, searching only to prosper from the misery of others. There are tales of a legendary ring and a child who is said to be the progeny of the All-Father.
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
This book is a tricky combination of historical context with norse mythology magic.
It is set with a growing feud between Harald Greycloak and Harald Bluetooth, steadily pitting Norway against Denmark.
However, the story focuses not on the kings and the tensions, but the individual lives of quite a cast of characters. So the history mentioend in the book blurb really is very distant and remote from narrated events and characters.
The reader is plunged straight into the action, so it can feel jarring and uncomfortable as the reader tries to not only keep pace, keep interest but also understand what on earth is going on, why rough norse soldiers are hunting a woman called Liv, why she is protecting a special ring and what it all has to do with a young boy.
The reader may get more confused when two other norse mercenaries, from the Jomsvikings, called Ari and Dag, then get entangled in Liv's fate, and secrets emerge of the past between Ari and Liv.
Unfortunately and uncomfortably that past is only explained after the half way point in the story when they both return to the place they grew up in order to escape the "bad" vikings.
Along the way they acquire allies in suprirsing places, and further on some allies betray them, some betray the enemy and join them. It all builds up to a climactic last stand because of a prophecy of power and heritage linking back to the Gods. And the Gods themselves are not totally silent in these events.
I certainly enjoyed it more after the half way point when all the secrets were revealed that made the connection between characters, friend and foe, make more sense as I then appreciated what was at stake and the extremes the enemies were at to claim it.
The only thing that slightly bothered me throughout was the omnisicent narrator leap frogging between more than two characters in any chapter. I'm so familiar with narrators devoting one chapter per character as a narrative style, so I kind of felt unable to really connect with any character because we didn't spend enough time with them.
But as a first novel with a very complicated plot Siobhan certainly did her best and you do get a sense of passion and heart behind it all.
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