I seem to have a knack for requesting review copies of books that are in the middle or at the end of a series. This is often because publisher’s aren’t particularly good about letting the reviewer know it’s the middle of a series. Such is the case here.

Blood Will Follow is book two in “The Valhalla Saga.” Two vikings have won a battle (Ulfar Thormodsson and Audun Arngrimsson), though it wasn’t easy and they lost many friends but something else as well. They are now immortal.

Sounds like a pretty good deal, but in this era, when Christianity is just getting a foothold in the Nordic countries, and the Norse gods still walk the earth, this leads to more questions than celebration.

Ulfar and Audun go off on their own to try to understand what has happened to them.

The book suffers (though that’s a bit of a harsh word) from the second book syndrome. I suspect that the characters were introduced in the first book, giving us some sort of action but really setting up who the people are. This book then sets the story. It seems evident that there is more to come and yet this book didn’t really have much of a beginning and no real conclusion.

I liked what I was reading … the writing is smooth and the characters and world interesting to me. But without knowing what’s really happening, this book doesn’t stand well, alone. I would be very interested in reading the first book and then deciding if I am interested enough to finish the series.

Looking for a good book? Blood Will Follow, by Snorri Kristjansson, is the second book in a series and doesn’t stand well as an individual novel, but the characters and setting (ancient Scandinavia) make this attractive.

I received a digital copy of this book from the publisher, through Edelweiss, in exchange for an honest review.