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mjporterauthor's review against another edition
4.0
I received a free copy from Netgalley.
This book intrigued me from the beginning - but perhaps the comments I read such as 'no one does Vikings like this' were slightly misleading for this particular book by the author. To begin with, I was quite confused by the direction the story was taking.
The characters in the book are intriguing and well thought out - well, most of them are, some of them are just confusing and it does take a while to sort out who everyone is, and it does, I'm afraid to say, start to become much easier to understand once the 'action' has started and the number of characters has diminished somewhat. That said, it takes nearly half of the book for this to happen, and the anticipation of 'who' will be the victim does start to become more important than why there will be a victim because the why is very clear from early on.
Much of the story is told from one point of view, that of Helga, and that is good. However, every so often, the author does drop in a different point of view, which is a bit jarring and perhaps not needed.
That said the book flows well, and I enjoyed reading it and only spent some of my time wondering about the historical accuracy of it all, and whether certain things would actually have happened.
An intriguing idea.
This book intrigued me from the beginning - but perhaps the comments I read such as 'no one does Vikings like this' were slightly misleading for this particular book by the author. To begin with, I was quite confused by the direction the story was taking.
The characters in the book are intriguing and well thought out - well, most of them are, some of them are just confusing and it does take a while to sort out who everyone is, and it does, I'm afraid to say, start to become much easier to understand once the 'action' has started and the number of characters has diminished somewhat. That said, it takes nearly half of the book for this to happen, and the anticipation of 'who' will be the victim does start to become more important than why there will be a victim because the why is very clear from early on.
Much of the story is told from one point of view, that of Helga, and that is good. However, every so often, the author does drop in a different point of view, which is a bit jarring and perhaps not needed.
That said the book flows well, and I enjoyed reading it and only spent some of my time wondering about the historical accuracy of it all, and whether certain things would actually have happened.
An intriguing idea.
terranovanz's review against another edition
2.0
I tried hard to love this book but it was just badly written. I like most of the characters and the setting but the story was jerky, confusing and didn't flow. 2.5/5 stars.
blodeuedd's review against another edition
4.0
It has been a very long time since I finished a book in a day. Not that I have not wanted to. But a baby makes it harder. But today everything came together, and it also helped that I could not put the book down and that it was so light and it flowed so well. Suddenly I was on page 150 and it felt like a blink of an eye. Who knew Viking crime drama could feel so light! In writing that it. In tone, eh, not so much. There will be blood as kin slay kin.
Helga is our heroine and she was awesome. She is the adoptive daughter in the house. Calm, patient and with a good eye for things. As she will soon learn.
Her foster parents have 3 sons and 1 daughter. And they all gather now. They all believe their father have hid a Viking treasure somewhere. They all have their own hidden agendas. This is a very dysfunctional family. Helga seems to be the only normal one.
Obviously there will be blood, and Helga is on the case.
Viking crime drama. Yes, honestly that truly says it all. Iceland, desolate, kin. Murder.
Oh it was just so good! I truly enjoyed this one. Writing that just flows. And a murder I could not figure out (but then I never can.)
Helga is our heroine and she was awesome. She is the adoptive daughter in the house. Calm, patient and with a good eye for things. As she will soon learn.
Her foster parents have 3 sons and 1 daughter. And they all gather now. They all believe their father have hid a Viking treasure somewhere. They all have their own hidden agendas. This is a very dysfunctional family. Helga seems to be the only normal one.
Obviously there will be blood, and Helga is on the case.
Viking crime drama. Yes, honestly that truly says it all. Iceland, desolate, kin. Murder.
Oh it was just so good! I truly enjoyed this one. Writing that just flows. And a murder I could not figure out (but then I never can.)
phie's review against another edition
1.0
a bit boring and you get introduced to way too many characters at once so you’re all the time confused who is who and what his/her role is
kirkw1972's review against another edition
4.0
Another day another book read in less than 24 hours. This is a really fast paced Viking murder mystery that kept me turning the pages right to the very end.
There are a lot of characters in the story and to start with I did have to keep going back and checking who was married to who but that seemed to settle down once the first murder kicked in. Having said that the author did manage to give each one their own personality certainly with the brothers and sisters in Unnthor's brood. I hope the follow up will start to unravel who Helga is, where she came from and what happened to her family. There's definitely a mystery there that needs solving.
I liked Helga, she was quite a well rounded character, intelligent and I liked the ways she tried to unravel the murders in the book. There's little of my imagined Vikings here, it's truly a crime story set in Viking times with everyone either too old now to go pillaging or engaged in farming and trading and I think that gave it a nice touch.
Overall I really enjoyed this and looking forward to the next one
Free arc from netgalley
There are a lot of characters in the story and to start with I did have to keep going back and checking who was married to who but that seemed to settle down once the first murder kicked in. Having said that the author did manage to give each one their own personality certainly with the brothers and sisters in Unnthor's brood. I hope the follow up will start to unravel who Helga is, where she came from and what happened to her family. There's definitely a mystery there that needs solving.
I liked Helga, she was quite a well rounded character, intelligent and I liked the ways she tried to unravel the murders in the book. There's little of my imagined Vikings here, it's truly a crime story set in Viking times with everyone either too old now to go pillaging or engaged in farming and trading and I think that gave it a nice touch.
Overall I really enjoyed this and looking forward to the next one
Free arc from netgalley
costa_steinunn's review against another edition
4.0
Helga Finnsdottir is grown with her adoptive family in East Norway in 970 c., but when the whole family gathers in the father house and Helga meets for the first time her adoptive sibling, she realizes that she doesn't actually know her own family, that some secrets divide it. That was supposed to be a feast that turns into a nightmare. Dissent and hints worm among the siblings. The legend of a hoard brought by the father from his journeys but never found lingers together with the murder of two of the brothers. In spite of herself, Helga is forced to doubt her certainties to find the murderer, and this brings her to understand that the farm where she's grown it's no more her home. She needed to find her place in the world.
"Kin" is to me that kind of story come by chance and you like not knowing why. I'm not fond of mystery, though this caught me, probably because the setting is an age I love to study, because of its characters and their relationships, because as I read it seemed to hold in my hand a real Saga of Icelanders, with its simple but not banal and evocative style.
I liked the social representation. For once, in a book set in the Viking Age, the Viking warriors, the violence of the weapons and the blood are not leading. Violence, of course, isn't absent, but it's the subtle one, the sneaky violence of manipulation.
"Kin" is to me that kind of story come by chance and you like not knowing why. I'm not fond of mystery, though this caught me, probably because the setting is an age I love to study, because of its characters and their relationships, because as I read it seemed to hold in my hand a real Saga of Icelanders, with its simple but not banal and evocative style.
I liked the social representation. For once, in a book set in the Viking Age, the Viking warriors, the violence of the weapons and the blood are not leading. Violence, of course, isn't absent, but it's the subtle one, the sneaky violence of manipulation.
adxthx's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
funny
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
3.5
pip94's review against another edition
3.0
*I received a digital copy from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review*
3.5 This is a mystery/ crime story featuring Vikings and a dysfunctional family. I thought the author did a great job at creating a rather sinister atmosphere and the pacing was well done. The plot was compelling, the writing is good and the characters are well written. If you enjoy a good crime story and/or Vikings then I would recommend checking this out.
3.5 This is a mystery/ crime story featuring Vikings and a dysfunctional family. I thought the author did a great job at creating a rather sinister atmosphere and the pacing was well done. The plot was compelling, the writing is good and the characters are well written. If you enjoy a good crime story and/or Vikings then I would recommend checking this out.
riverwise's review against another edition
4.0
A departure for Snorri Kristjansson here. Well, not that much of a departure - this is still very much about Vikings, but it has quite a different feel from the Swords Of Good Men books. There are no epic voyages (in fact, the whole thing takes place on one farmstead), and no magic or Norse Gods (weeeeeelll, almost no Norse Gods...). The main attraction for me was the evocation of domestic life in Viking times, which was convincing and interesting, with the push and pull of honour and hearth. At heart though this is a crime novel, a murder mystery where family tensions spill over into bloodshed. It's every Christmas Day dinner argument you've ever had turned up to eleven. With knives. A good read, and with a second book already promised, this could be a series to look out for,
pagesforages's review against another edition
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
1.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Violence
Minor: Sexual harassment and Sexual content