Vanessa MacLellan

The story opens in the middle of the action with a burning village and sixteen-year-old Balin running to help where he can and running to find safety. The rest of the story takes place mostly within Fort Resonbirg as the inhabitants and refugees face the challenges of being under siege along with a host of strange, terrifying events that eat away at their courage. It’s a tale of nobles and commoners thrust together in trying and confusing circumstances and one boy’s struggles to define himself and his place. This isn’t a fast-paced book for the most part. It takes its time in establishing the plight of the besieged, their confusion, and their search for answers.

Elements I liked:
The Norse elements are strongly present in the story, without it being a retelling of, or creative variation of, a well-known myth (to the best of my knowledge, anyway). I loved the feel of the story — the author did a great job of capturing that particular flavor that permeates old tales translated from the Norse. I especially liked that the author included kennings, something so common in those old Norse tales. A wonderful touch!

The story is full of rich details that build on each other to present the truths behind the war and siege. The world has a unique flavor — a mix of the medieval and more-modern — with swords and commoners and nobles, alongside rifles and photographs and references to trains. The detailed descriptions are often striking, such as “By the time he reached the top floor, his breath was a tattered pinion on the wind…” and “One could reach up, scrape his fingers against the sky, gray and sinking, and scoop away a palmful of cloud…”.

Elements I struggled with:
The pace for the middle section of the book slowed considerably as the characters struggled to find solutions to the horrible events befalling them. Balin was often in a kind of fog, which unfortunately left me less connected to him and the ongoing happenings, giving the feeling that no one had much of a sense of urgency about their situation. When the story finally indicated how little time had passed for that section, it came as quite the surprise. With the amount of time the story spent there, it felt like much more time would have passed.

Overall:
This unique Norse-flavored tale is an engaging and riveting read. Full of a lot of details, this isn’t a story to charge through; rather, it’s one to savor while enjoying all the fine points.

(Read September 2022)… (meer)