Ugh. I know the author’s other work is a 5 book series so I had assumed that this, too, was setting up a longer series and then discovered halfway through when looking up the sequel that it was the first of a duology. Based on what happens in book 1, I’m very much thinking this story would have been better served as a stand alone novel.
Here is the thing – it’s hard to write a story that has a twist that is going to surprise a frequent reader. Because if you properly foreshadow or set the groundwork for reveals like you should, there is a good chance that someone that has read a lot will pick up on them and guess ahead of time. However, being predictable doesn’t make a book good or bad – readers are going to be just as irritated (or more) by an unearned twist or reveal as an overly predictable one. Instead, it needs to make sense that the characters don’t figure out the reveal, even if it feels obvious to the reader because otherwise, you start thinking the characters are dumb. And it also helps to have a story that is otherwise engaging with interesting characters that help make an enjoyable journey, even if the reader knows exactly where it is going to end up.
Another duology (The Shepherd King) I read earlier this year had a similar potential challenge where the reveal seemed pretty obvious and one way the author balanced it was to have the reveal come two thirds of the way into the novel – she didn’t make it the climax or finale that the novel had been building to. In this novel, the reveal is the climax/conclusion but if this story had been combined with the next novel to be a standalone, it could have come at the halfway point or earlier which I think would have helped.
The main character of this novel is Freya, who was an incredibly frustrating character to read. I quite liked her introduction: she is stuck in a marriage to a horrible man, all for the benefit of her own family, and her reaction to his betrayal sets her up for an interesting journey. It’s just that for most of the middle of the book, her main character trait seems to be annoyed and rash?
Freya has been hiding a secret – she is blessed by the goddess, Hlin. In this world, some are blessed by the gods with one drop of blood at or around conception; they (and their parents) don’t always know until they find themselves able to call on their gods’ power. For Freya’s cruel husband, he has been blessed by the god of the sea or fish, and has power to call fish, thus having the ability to prevent the village from starving. There is a prophecy about the shield maiden, one blessed by Hlin. It is foretold that whoever controls her will become king of all the clans/tribes etc, and Jarl Snorri has spent the last 20 years looking for her. Now that he has discovered Freya, he is not letting her go, forcing her to accompany him back to his main city and into marriage to further assert his control.
Of course, Snorri isn’t the one Freya has complicated feelings towards – that would be his son Bjorn, himself blessed by the god Tyr with a magical fire ax ability. Bjorn and Freya go back and forth between moments of understanding and bickering but in most of their exchanges, Freya seemed to be reacting to slights that had nothing to do with her. Freya starts the novel talking about how her father trained both her and her brother to fight but the very first time Freya is asked to participate in a real fight, she realizes just how very far from reality her father’s teaching was and how behind she is … and yet she gets mad at Bjorn when he wants to train her on the basics (the book does later introduce a character that tells Freya she needs to train with women warriors who understand her limitations more but since this wasn’t an option earlier, I am still giving the point to Bjorn). Bjorn very clearly is not a fan of prophecy and values his freedom but Freya feels personally insulted when he is abrasive about his father’s order to basically attach himself to Freya’s hip to protect her. Gee, I wonder why you think having a decent conversation with a guy means he should automatically be excited/honored to be your shadow.
Freya’s family has taken advantage of Freya’s continued willingness to put aside her wants and desires for what will benefit her family, and they don’t appreciate or even truly acknowledge it. The woman has reason to be angry and frustrated. A lot of other reviews seem to refer to female rage as well but to me, there was too much irrationality attached to it, with Freya constantly lashing out recklessly at the wrong targets so that I didn’t appreciate that side of her. Unfortunately it also just felt like we were replaying the same scenes and internal monologues over and over again: the other leaders don’t want Snorri in charge so keep attacking him to kill Freya or take her as their own; Freya realizing how horrible Snorri is because he cares more about his warriors and the prophecy than the rest of his people; etc. It all could have been easily condensed/sped along to make this a tight and focused stand alone novel instead of a frustrating beginning to a duology that takes a promising idea and stretches it out too much.