This book collects the first two books in the trilogy, natch. A featured selection in the Science Fiction Book Club, too, I learned from the ephemera that came with the book–namely, the flyer for the month where the book was featured.<\/p>\n
I like Harry Harrison. I read his Planet of No Return<\/i> in middle school, and I’ve dabbled with the Stainless Steel Rat series (see also The Stainless Steel Rat for President<\/i><\/a>). I’ve even discovered that I read another alt history book of his recentlyish (Stars and Stripes Triumphant<\/i><\/a>, July 2006). I characterized this as an alt history book as well when I bought it, but it’s more fantasy than straight ahead alt history.<\/p>\n The books center on Shef, a thrall raised by the local karl (minor royalty figure) who kept Shef’s mother. As a bastard, he’s mistreated of course, but he learns some smithing. When a band of Vikings invade to avenge their father, Shef becomes part of their army to rescue his captured stepsister. Then he rises in the ranks and becomes a lord in his own right, guided by a mysterious god-figure who thwarts even Othin.<\/p>\n It’s a fantasy book because it does feature Norse gods as real people, includes a lot of visions and stuff. The two books clock in at 800 pages, so I felt my bottom in the chair, so to speak, although the books were good enough reading as I went along. Although the battle scenes are more Patick O’Brian than Bernard Cornwell in that they’re rather anti-climactic and a bit of an afterthought, with much of the book coming in the in-between things going on. A bit of a knock, but I guess I did end the reading experience with the end of the middle part of the trilogy. If I stopped watching the first Star Wars trilogy after A Empire Strikes Back<\/i>, I’d been left a little hanging.<\/p>\n Of course, if that’s the metaphor that holds, I’d better not read the third in this series, or I’ll find that the Ewoks keep the Norse gods from winning at Ragnarok.<\/p>\n