Rating: 3 out of 5
I am not sure this qualifies as very thoughtful literature, but it was definitely easy to read. Mr Taber’s adventures in the Labrador/Newfoundland area were quite fun, if not very complex — and by which I mean that one could probably guess the ending of the series from the first book. But, that’s not always a bad thing.
I did start questioning how far this cliche-riddled attitude would go, but fortunately it found it’s natural course between two crazed brothers, a noble soul, and serving the Norse gods. There could have been more of a description of how Norse life occurred. At present, there is talk of farmsteads, villages, and people spreading from vale to vale, but there’s little detail.
And, of course, what I would have liked to see a lot more was a good description of the natural wilderness of ‘Norse Markland’ along with the ups or downs of it. Similarly, the ‘Valefolk’ were pretty random in how they came into the story, what they believed, how they behaved, etc… — again, much more could have been interwoven into the story to actually describe some aspects of this new world the Norse went to.
So, there wasn’t perhaps as much world-building than I hoped going in, but it still makes for a solid adventure story. While this series is not going to win any prizes, I am more than likely to continue on with the next instalment when it comes out.
