Blog Tour | Northern Wrath

I am very excited to be a part of the blog tour for Northern Wrath. This is book 1 in The Hanged God Trilogy by Thilde Kold Holdt. Huge thank you to Solaris Books and The Write Reads for having me on the tour! This will be a three part tour, join me over the next week to hear my thoughts on this brilliant trilogy. We begin the tour today with my thoughts on Northern Wrath!

Following in the steps of Neil Gaiman & Joanne Harris, the author expertly weaves Norse myths and compelling characters into this fierce, magical epic fantasy.

A dead man, walking between the worlds, foresees the end of the gods.

A survivor searching for a weapon releases a demon from fiery Muspelheim.

A village is slaughtered by Christians, and revenge must be taken.

The bonds between the gods and Midgard are weakening. It is up to Hilda, Ragnar, their tribesmen Einer and Finn, the chief’s wife Siv and Tyra, her adopted daughter, to fight to save the old ways from dying out, and to save their gods in the process.

A huge thank you again to The Write Reads for having me on this tour, and to Solaris for kindly sending me books 2 & 3 of this trilogy to read and review.

Northern Wrath is the first book in a brilliant Viking fantasy novel which features a large selection of characters, and covers a wide swathe of worlds and viewpoints. This novel has all the great elements of fantasy that I love; the Gods feature heavily, there is magic, and so many battles! The characters’ stories intertwine and overlap considerably at various points throughout the novel, which adds a lot of dimension and depth to the reading experience!

The main plot follows the threat of the disappearance of the Norse Gods, and the power of their runes, both due to the influence of Christianity, and perhaps something more. The loss of these Gods and all the magic they hold threatens all of the Nineworlds, and we follow characters as they try to live with these changes, and the few who refuse to let this happen.

I adore the Norse setting of this novel, it was something a little unusual for me in my fantasy reading, and it’s so well crafted by Holdt. I have some basic knowledge of Norse mythology but it is very basic, so I was a touch concerned that I wouldn’t have enough background knowledge to fully appreciate this book. I’m happy to report that I didn’t struggle with the details of Northern Wrath at all. Everything is very well explained when it needs to be, and it’s done in a subtle way so it never feels like a great dump of information in the text. There are also more than enough clues to pick up a lot of the pertinent points from context clues too, which I appreciated.

You can see just how deep an understanding Holdt has of Norse and Viking history, and how passionately she cares about getting things right, everything in the novel is treated with care. Even the smallest details are described with knowledge and it was a pleasure to get swept away in a novel with such a deep and enthralling world the author built.

Northern Wrath features a wide variety of characters, all of which I think are very well developed and read as fully fleshed characters. This is quite a task with a cast of characters as large as we get introduced to in this novel, but Holdt does a wonderful job. Every character has a unique voice, and the different perspectives are well crafted. My particular favourite characters are definitely Hilda and Tyra! These two female characters experience completely different journeys in the novel but both are excellently developed and I am both excited and nervous to see where their stories go in the rest of the trilogy.

Overall I really liked Northern Wrath a lot. I can’t wait to see what happens in the next book, and where the author will take us across the entire trilogy. From page one, this action packed novel was impossible to put down, and I highly recommend to fantasy lovers!

Thank you again to Solaris Books and The Write Reads for having me!

Buy the book from Waterstones here or Bookshop.org here

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