If you want to read a good Viking novel, your choices are pretty few. There’s me, of course, but I’m out of print. Bernard Cornwell is doing a series about Vikings and Saxons in Alfred’s England (I’m avoiding them, though, because, from what I read, he’s trashing Christianity again. I wish he wouldn’t do that. I really like Cornwell otherwise). There’s Tim Severin’s new series, which I haven’t gotten around to reading yet, mea culpa. You can sometimes find a copy of the English translation of Frans Gunnar Bengtsson’s The Long Ships here or there.
But the field is pretty sparse. Which is why I’m delighted to welcome Judson Roberts to our small but elite club.
Viking Warrior is a Young Adult novel which will be enjoyed by older readers as well. It begins the story of Halfdan, who, as the story opens, is a young slave on a large farm in Denmark. He is actually the natural son of the chieftain who owns the farm, but his mother is a slave from Ireland. So all his life he has known only hard work and bitterness.
Everything changes when his master and the master’s son return from an abortive raid in England. His master is dying. On his deathbed, he makes a bargain with Halfdan’s mother—he will acknowledge Halfdan, free him, and make him an heir. But in return Halfdan’s mother must make a terrible sacrifice. She does this willingly, in a deeply moving but troubling segment of the story.
Suddenly Halfdan’s life is changed out of recognition. Harald, his master’s freeborn son and chief heir, befriends him and begins to teach Halfdan the skills of a warrior. Harald is extremely likeable, and Halfdan grows in character as he learns to set aside old angers, even as he is learning a whole new way of living.
One thing Harald does not need to teach Halfdan is the use of the bow. Halfdan has been learning the arts of the bowyer and the fletcher for years, and has been hunting in secret. His skill with a bow is already formidable, and it’s a skill he’ll come to need very much, very soon.
Because there is an enemy out there—a vicious and ruthless enemy who wants the whole family dead; one who cares nothing for honor or fair dealing, nor for how many murders it takes to achieve his goal.
I can hardly think of a way this book could have been better. If I’d written it, I’d have taken pains to anglicize the speech a little more—to avoid words with Latin roots, but that’s my own bugbear, and probably means little to the average reader. The prose was tight, the characters well-rounded, the emotions rang true, and the plot was compelling. I wished it were longer—but fortunately there’s a sequel for me to order.
References to Christianity were generally negative, but that was appropriate to the story. Although Halfdan’s mother is a Christian, she doesn’t seem to have conveyed much of it to her son, so Halfdan’s opinions are those of the average Scandinavian heathen of the time. There is a ceremonial matter toward the beginning of the story that was extremely conflicting for me to read, but it was in no way unreasonable in the time and place.
The only false note (in my opinion) was a scene later in the book, where Halfdan, having killed his first man, is troubled not to feel any guilt about it. I think that’s a projection of modern and Christian values. I don’t believe a Norse pagan in the 9th Century would have been bothered by that at all. I think he would have been pleased.
But that’s the sort of thing it’s almost impossible to avoid, when moderns write about the past. I’m sure I’ve done the same in my own books.
I strongly recommend Viking Warrior. Cautions for violence and sexual references (but no explicit sex scenes). It would make a much-valued Christmas gift for that Viking aficionado on your gift list (and who doesn’t have one of those?).
In fairness to Cornwell…his anti-Christianity is far less preachy in his Viking books (or at least those that I’ve read) than in the An Archer’s Tale series.
In fact, a constant amusement comes from the tension between the firmly pagan protagonist (who sees the warrior’s life as common-sensical) and the pious academic Alfred the Great. Alfred isn’t perfect, and in addition to being truly pious is shown to use religion in a very manipulative manner to enact his vision of a peaceful and moral England, but all in all he feels pretty believable.
That said, priests get a pretty bad rap–a few are good Christians and good men, more are questionable Christians but good chaps anyway, a lot are evil hypocrites. Given the chaos of the time and the power given to the church–again, I don’t know that this wasn’t realistic.
Really, my experience from reading the books was paradoxical–one roots for the fierce and pagan protagonist, but gets the sense that Christianity, for all its flaws, is making England a better place (esp. for women).
That said–it certainly has all of Cornwall’s other problematic areas. That is, there’s generally some sex in every book, and at least one too-graphic description of the rape and plunder that happens when a city is taken.
I actually wish Cornwell would write sailing thrillers again. I loved those books, but apparently they didn’t sell very well.
Lars; I was baffled by your comment the hero would have been untroubled by guilt. (We’ll leave aside how you could know this in every case.) Don’t you believe that all men (made originally in the image of God)have the law of God written on their hearts? Don’t you believe that all men have at least some knowledge of God’s moral law? (How else could men be converted?)
I believe all men are born with a conscience, but conscience is partly conditioned by culture. In this case, the hero asked himself what kind of person it made him if he wasn’t ashamed of killing a man. I don’t believe a man raised in Viking culture would ask that question, whatever he might feel.
It is an interesting point to ponder…one which I would love a definitive answer for.
I mean, what is it that the “eternity-in-the-hearts-of-men” universal conscience really speaks out against. Is it the literal taking of human life, so that only by the act of conditioning (i.e. taking multiple lives) the soldier/executioner learns to ignore it?
Or is it murder, the wrongful taking of lives, and only our modern culture has sensitized us so that any real-life violence is anathema?
(For me the question is significant today, if only in terms of the documented frequency of emotional instability among soldiers in the Vietnam and Iraq wars. Is it the culture that is at fault? Our lack of disciplined forces due to the draft and now the paucity of volunteers? Or was it always this way and old soldiers just knew how to ‘grin and bear it’?)
Re. Cornwell’s sailing books: I haven’t read them, but can any sailing book equal the near-perfection of the Master and Commander series?
I think most people historically have understood that defensive killing is different from murder. Most have also assumed that revenge is different. I think we learned to reject revenge because of Christ’s teaching, not conscience.
As for Cornwell’s sailing novels, they’re not big battleship books, like O’Brien’s. They’re modern mysteries and thrillers set in a sailboat environment. (I just like sailing, at least in theory.)
There are Viking books that have a good Christian theme.
I invite you to review the Frozen Trail to Merica novels. A complimentary copy of the eBook is available at http://www.frozentrail.org/store/traildown
(Please restrict above web page for your personal use only.)
The eBook, Frozen Trail to Merica, has been published in print as two novels: Talerman and Walking to Merica by Galde Press, quality books that make a difference. http://www.GaldePress.com .
While being enjoyable historical fiction novels, the Frozen Trail to Merica novels also solve the mysterious disappearance of Norse from the Western Settlement of Greenland in the 1300s, and explain the Delaware (Lenape) Indian history, the Walam Olum, which was first spoken in Old Norse.
The fictional plot of Frozen Trail to Merica is based on Chapter 3 of the Walam Olum, an about 1400 AD creation of picture sticks with associated memory verses.
After reading the eBook, Frozen Trail to Merica, Hal Sherman, Adopted Shawnee historian, wrote “I … had always felt the Walam Olum to be a true, historical document and your story erases all my doubts.”
Talerman is also available at http://www.amazon.com/ . (Search for Frozen Trail.)
and http://www.frozentrail.org/ .
Partners Wholesalers now stocks the book for booksellers.
Walking to Merica is scheduled for printing in early 2008.
Have an enjoyable read.
Myron
Myron Paine, Ph D
1716 Elderwood CT
Martinez, CA 94553
myronpaine@frozentrail.org
http://www.frozentrail.org
925 957 0260
Must be evidence of slow electorns.
It took 3 1/2 years to connect.
In the meantime the Frozen Trail to Merica has turned into the Lenape epic (click on Lenale Epic, Lenape Epic after a web search.
The books are now classics. The only books on real history of North America 150 years before the Invaders arrived.