HISTORICAL URBAN FANTASY REVIEW: Tomes of the Dead: The Viking Dead - Toby Venables

Release Date: 12/04/11

SYNOPSIS:

976 AD – Northern Europe. BjÓlf and the viking crew of the ship Hrafn flee up an unknown river after a bitter battle, only to find themselves in a bleak land of pestilence. The dead don’t lie down, but become what the villagers call draugr – the undead – returning to feed on the flesh of their kin. Terrible stories are told of a dark castle in a hidden fjord, and of black ships that come raiding with invincible draugr berserkers. And no sooner has BjÓlf resolved to leave, than the black ships appear... Now stranded, his men cursed by the contagion of walking death, BjÓlf has one choice: fight his way through a forest teeming with zombies, invade the castle and find the secret of the horrific condition – or submit to an eternity of shambling, soulless undeath!


REVIEW:

Fans of the undead and the gory hack and slash combat are going to love this new addition from Abaddon as the undead rise to shamble along against the sea wolves in this outing from the imagination from Toby Venables. It’s well written, the characters are battle hardened but perhaps not quite expecting exactly what happens within. Add to this a well thought out story arc, great prose and more than a few twists for the reader to get their teeth into and you know that it is going to be something different to a lot of the titles out there.

All in, this book was a lot of fun to read and whilst some of the more modern set titles within the Tomes of the Dead series go for thought provoking, this one is unashamedly a battle to the death against the undead hordes as the Raiders may well find that they’ve bitten off more than they can chew. Great fun.