Viking Blood and Blade (The Viking Blood and Blade Saga Book 1)

Love the characters in this book.. The author does a great job introducing them gradually too so that you don’t get lost with the names etc. Have already downloaded the next in the series 🥰

I didn’t know what to expect exactly when I initially bought this out of sheer curiosity. The plot involving Ivar The Boneless and the Great Heathen Army piqued my interest. However, as soon as I began reading it, I couldn’t put it down. I was enthralled from beginning to end; the blinding pace, gruesome action and exciting plot blew me away and kept me gripped throughout. I loved the the first book in the series and ended up ordering the second one before I even finished the first. I particularly liked the portrayal of Ivar.As somebody who owns all of the Last Kingdom books, I think it’s safe to say that Peter Gibbons is more than worthy of being mentioned within the same breath. This book was just as good as any of the Last Kingdom books, of which I’m a huge fan. So if you like high-octane historical fiction set during the Viking Age, then I can’t recommend this enough. I can’t wait to read the rest of the series.

Being a fan of anything Viking I have to say this book did not disappoint. It took a while to disengage my brain from it's previous understanding of Ivar the Boneless, from the TV series, to the one portrayed by Mr Gibbons, but he was equally ruthless in both. There were many editing errors left uncorrected and I was often frustrated by repeated descriptions, often only a page or two later. That said, I look forward to reading the next book in the series where I hope the writing might be a little more in tandem with readers who enjoy a higher level of literature to match the intelligent plot.I also hope to see the main character become mature enough to avoid the rather selfish and thoughtless actions he took throughout this first story.

That may be an unfair review title but after reading all of Bernard Cornwell’s Uhtred series, i never thought anything could come close but this very much does, though in a different way. Suffice to say this was well worth it and I’ve bought the rest of the series to prove it!

Enjoy it and found it very descriptive and moved at pace

Very much in the Bernard Cornwell, Simon Scarrow, Matthew Harffy, etc mould. This is the first in an intended series of books and it shows promise (Hundr = Utred = Beobrand = Cato).The story line is pretty good with the characters being developed well so that you learn the relevant cast-names etc without effort - top marks for that.His story-telling is good but not up to the other authors mentioned YET. Irritating little errors appear from time to time and sometimes there are confusing switches between characters. It gives the impression that it was written slowly over time or perhaps edited without enough care. Bigger errors appear from time to time revealing that not quite enough research has been done.Because it is fresh in my mind, I will paraphrase an example I read last night in his second book: 'Whilst travelling to Dublin with a "Westerly Wind" the crew laboriously rowed up the coast until they were able to set sail and let the wind drive them into the river Liffey.'Oh dear. He seems to be confusing 'Westerly wind' with 'Westerly currents'. Wind is described as where it is coming FROM and currents are described as where they are heading TO. That is not an error to make when a large part of the book(s) deals with Vikings sailing from place to place.Although I have never sailed a Viking long-boat, they have decent keels (it is a Norse word after all!) so I am confident they would sail North very well in a "Westerly wind". They could probably sail much closer to the wind than 90degrees. Perhaps a friendly Norseman will correct me if I am wrong.In the meantime, I look forward to the next book in the series so I can follow Hundr's progress.

I’ve read both books in the Saxon Warrior series and enjoyed them so I thought I’d give this series a try and I’m glad I did.

It’s not often I come across a book that I just couldn’t put down, but this was a page turner right from the start. The main character is well drawn with a mysterious past, which gradually comes to light as the book progresses. Unlike some books, there are an interesting and well developed group of supporting characters. I particularly liked the way the author puts across their thoughts.As you would expect in a ‘Viking Age’ novel, there is plenty of blood, guts and fighting, and it’s all handled very deftly, without getting bogged down in details.I really liked the style of writing: speech and thoughts are modern-ish, and there’s no mention of ‘wenches’ etc to make you think it all happened a long time ago.If I have one little gripe, it’s the proofreading, which every so often lets in a grammatical error or a sentence that needs rereading as a word is missing. However, this isn’t enough to dampen my huge enjoyment of this book. Quite reminiscent of Giles Christian’s Raven books which was another excellent series.Great work Mr Gibbons, and I can’t wait to get started on No 2.