Valkyrie Rising by Ingrid Paulson | Book Review

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Pages: 352

Genre: young adult fantasy, norse mythology

Synopsis

Nothing ever happens in Norway. But at least Ellie knows what to expect when she visits her grandmother: a tranquil fishing village and long, slow summer days. And maybe she’ll finally get out from under the shadow of her way-too-perfect big brother, Graham, while she’s there.

What Ellie doesn’t anticipate is Graham’s infuriating best friend, Tuck, tagging along for the trip. Nor did she imagine boys going missing amid rumors of impossible kidnappings. Least of all does she expect something powerful and ancient to awaken in her and that strange whispers would urge Ellie to claim her place among mythological warriors. Instead of peace and quiet, there’s suddenly a lot for a girl from L.A. to handle on a summer sojourn in Norway! And when Graham vanishes, it’s up to Ellie—and the ever-sarcastic, if undeniably alluring Tuck—to uncover the truth about all the disappearances and thwart the nefarious plan behind them.

My thoughts

Rating out of five: three stars

I picked this book up because it was set in Norway (my country) and, most importantly, it dealt with norse mythology, as the Valkyrie is female creatures that choose which warriors die or live in battle.

The way I found some of the plot-structure lacking reminded me of fairytale retellings that bases themselves too much about pointing out characters the reader knows and letting what you know or don’t know about these write most of their character, instead of actually setting the feeling and motives themself. Which meant that I thought a lot of the norse mythology parts were missing in this book, strange for a book that’s supposedly all about the valkyrie. None of the gods have motives, or a personality that fit with their norse mythology stories. They don’t act the way they do in the ‘historical’ stories. Which is okay if that’s an obvious choice made in the book, but it didn’t seem to be. The main character even pointed to history when trying to learn about them. It was more about trying to fit these gods into the ‘bad guy’, ‘helper’ and ‘savior’ roles already made, which hurt my head a bit.

It’s a good coming-of-age story, but pretty basic except for the god-stuff. Falling in love with your brother’s friend is a well-used, great plotline. But trying to write something epic and a YA story in 350 pages, without using any space in the beginning to flesh out the characters, it was bound to have faults.

The ending was impressive in comparison to the rest, but overall it didn’t pull itself together enough for me. The norwegian setting parts of this book were more on-point, which I appreciated, it’s obvious the author has some familiarity.

Norse Mythology | Quote of the Week #17

This week’s quote is in honor of the sun disappearing for the next five months. Guess where I live? Westcoast of Norway, in a valley where I cannot believe people still live in the winter months as the mountains are too tall for the few sunbeams there are in the winter to reach us. (I love this place, promise.) My grandmother, who was Sami from the nothern part of the country – where there’s no sun for half the year, and always sun for the other half – would complain about it constantly and that makes me smile.

One branch of my family has lived in this place for generations. They were smarter than us though – they settled on the other side of the freaking fjord (water), on a mountain farm with few neighbours where they had to use boat to get anywhere, but guess what they had? SUN.

Also I liked this retelling of norse mythology by Neil Gaiman, even if it was a lot of things I knew already, here’s my review.

Norse Mythology by Neil Gaiman | Review

Pages: 300

Genre: mythology, fantasy

LOOK AT THAT COVER!

I already liked this book by page fourteen, because in the quote above Gaiman is basically describing my home and I agree it makes a lot of sense to not like your gods if they keep burying you in snow and forget humans need sunlight once in a while. Also scandinavians doesn’t really trust anyone as a rule and/or joke. Mostly joke, nowadays. Also no! This is not connected to american gods, it’s a retelling of the old norse myths. I’ve glanced at the reviews for this book, and it’s obvious some have no idea what they’re writing about, that this book is based on real myths and that’s why it’s a series of short stories and not one connected plot. I’ll come back to that later.

[About Loki] He is tolerated by the gods, perhaps because his stratagems and plans save them as often as they get them into trouble.

What I mostly took from these stories was that the gods of Asgard would be incredibly bored without Loki there and I don’t know why I feel this symphatic towards his monster children, but to banish one to the edge of the world, one to underneath the earth and one in chains seems awful. Joke’s on them, but mostly on humans, whyy did anyone think this was a good idea. Also I predict “Shut up, Thor” will be my favourite line of the whole book.

“Because,” said Thor, “when something goes wrong, the first thing I always think is, it is Loki’s fault. It saves a lot of time.”

Would recommend this book for anyone who’s interested in norse mythology, especially after watching “Thor”, that’s why this book is published now isn’t it? Basically, this book is for beginners. Please go read up on the edda if you want something traditional and to understand where this book came from, the language isn’t that difficult in the modern versions. Know that the stories are modernized some and rewritten, that’s the whole point of having Gaiman write them, but the right elements are definitely there. I was pretty well-known with norse mythology already, through school and own interest, and didn’t really find anything new. But it was somewhere between an okay and fun read, with some stories I found more interesting than others. Mostly I liked the stories that required charging the jotner (giants?) and including Frøya.  And I like this type of Loki, if you haven’t guessed already:

“Well? You know something. I can see it in your face. Tell me whatever you know, and tell it now. I don’t trust you, Loki, and I want to know what you know right this moment, before you’ve had the chance to plot and plan.”
Loki, who plotted and planned as easily as other folk breathed in and out, smiled at Thor’s anger and innocence.