Once again Wood breaks with his previous storyline and instead collects a handful of standalone stories into one volume. Each has a very distinct flavour so it looks a little like he's trying to cover all the bases in one go.

I particularly liked the Shieldmaiden's story, since it explored the role of Viking women more than previous volumes were able to. These women are thrown into their warrior aspects seemingly by chance, but they prove that they can surprise (and beat) the almighty Romans with their intellect.

Less intriguing were the stories about Sven of Orkney (a familiar face) and the single combat warriors. Both were well written, but they also seemed a bit shallow on closer inspection; we've done the whole battle thing already. ( )

This is a short story collection, rather than one continuous story the way the first 2 books in this series were. Some of the stories were as vague and flat as unsuccessful non-graphic short stories, but I liked the 2-part story about the shield maidens, and in general I found that Wood maintains more focus in his stories when they are shorter like this. I still liked the first book best, but this one was better than the second book, by far. ( )

This volume consists of a couple of different shorter stories. The first about a young boy who feels more tied to his dead mother's viking heritage then his living fathers' new Christianity. When the vikings come the child sides with the vikings and grows to become one of them, even though they will always see him as outsiders. This story had me trying to figure out who is really practicing a betrayal here, and I thought it was kind of amazing.
The second story is more of an in depth view of hand to hand combat and strategy which kind of lost me a little bit b/c what I like is seeing people react. You do learn a bit about the characters but it's so couched in the battle stuff that it lost me.
The third story is about three women who are the remaining survivors of their town. They want to not only survive but strike fear into the men. This was probably one of my favorites, I loved seeing how tough these women were and the interplay between the three of them as they were clearly very different people.
The last story is a throwback to the first volume of Northlanders. We get a chance to see how Sven is living his life with his wife and children. We see that he is still tough but how his children have made him a little bit softer. ( )

This volume consists of a couple of different shorter stories. The first about a young boy who feels more tied to his dead mother's viking heritage then his living fathers' new Christianity. When the vikings come the child sides with the vikings and grows to become one of them, even though they will always see him as outsiders. This story had me trying to figure out who is really practicing a betrayal here, and I thought it was kind of amazing.
The second story is more of an in depth view of hand to hand combat and strategy which kind of lost me a little bit b/c what I like is seeing people react. You do learn a bit about the characters but it's so couched in the battle stuff that it lost me.
The third story is about three women who are the remaining survivors of their town. They want to not only survive but strike fear into the men. This was probably one of my favorites, I loved seeing how tough these women were and the interplay between the three of them as they were clearly very different people.
The last story is a throwback to the first volume of Northlanders. We get a chance to see how Sven is living his life with his wife and children. We see that he is still tough but how his children have made him a little bit softer. ( )

This volume consists of a couple of different shorter stories. The first about a young boy who feels more tied to his dead mother's viking heritage then his living fathers' new Christianity. When the vikings come the child sides with the vikings and grows to become one of them, even though they will always see him as outsiders. This story had me trying to figure out who is really practicing a betrayal here, and I thought it was kind of amazing.
The second story is more of an in depth view of hand to hand combat and strategy which kind of lost me a little bit b/c what I like is seeing people react. You do learn a bit about the characters but it's so couched in the battle stuff that it lost me.
The third story is about three women who are the remaining survivors of their town. They want to not only survive but strike fear into the men. This was probably one of my favorites, I loved seeing how tough these women were and the interplay between the three of them as they were clearly very different people.
The last story is a throwback to the first volume of Northlanders. We get a chance to see how Sven is living his life with his wife and children. We see that he is still tough but how his children have made him a little bit softer. ( )