A review by chrudos
The Whale Road by Robert Low

3.0

Quite glad I am done with this book. I think I had too high expectations based on friends' reviews so I was a bit disappointed. Especially after recently reading [b:Odin's Wolves|13531842|Odin's Wolves (Raven, #3)|Giles Kristian|https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1344371525s/13531842.jpg|14619615]. The Whale Road had everything I should enjoy - set in the dark age, pagans, raiding, brotherhood, long journeys, drinking, shieldwalls... But yet, is was not such a great experience. Many of the aspects that I enjoyed in this book (fight scenes, naturalistic descriptions of the life of raiding party) were better described somewhere else. And the whole journey aspect of the book was almost missing altogether. When I remember the magnificent descriptions form [b:Byzantium|405589|Byzantium|Stephen R. Lawhead|https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1348701821s/405589.jpg|2694949] that was following almost exactly the same rout, the absence of these details becomes very salient. It seems like the whole book was broken into episodes with almost no travelling at all. In the focus it might be closer to the original sagas than the books I just mentioned, but I am not sure I can appreciate that aspect that much. I am planning to give at least one more chance to Oathsworn by reading the next book in the series, but I certainly need a break from it first.