This book was supposed to amuse me. You failed, book. So badly. And that makes me sad.What is it about Connie Mason's writing? It's flat, uninteresting, and utterly blah. I could never remember where I left off, and had forgotten stuff I read just the day before. Nothing stuck. Nothing stood out.The premise also sucks. In a nutshell: Thorne the Relentless ventures onto the Isle of Man with his Vikings and sees the beautimous Celtic maiden Fiona bathing naked in the moonlight, cuz of course. He manages to take in her raven tresses and violet eyes (cuz of course) and tries to have his Viking way with her, but the slender little thing manages to kick back the Viking giant on his ass and run away. He leaves, but is obsessed with her. This means (of course) that she's a witch and she placed a spell on him. How to lift the curse?The plot didn't know where the hell it was going most of the time. It was all based around Fiona Being a Witch, and The Curse Must Be Lifted. Thorne's solutions varied from I Must Kill Her (then of course he couldn't) to I'll Fuck Her So Much And Get Her Out Of My System (yeah, that always works in Romancelandia) to I'll Marry Her (wha??????) to.... I don't know what, cuz I had to stop reading and prevent the inevitable Death By Boredom. I took the advice of a Very Trusted Person and simply read the last chapter to see what happened. Not much.Fiona's fellow Celt-in-slavery, the wizard Brann, also contributed to the utter lameness of the proceedings by proclaiming that Fiona and Thorne were destined to be together, and therefore every bad thing that Thorne did made Fiona weep tears of misunderstanding, because "I'll not live long enough to turn him into the kind of man I can love." Yes, because that always works, too.Things happen out of the blue with no backup reason - it just "suddenly occurs" to people, or "without thinking" people do things that then cause stuff to move the "plot" along. This paint-by-numbers book was phoned in. Nothing memorable about it. It was beige, I tell you. Beige.In the Author's Note, she proclaims that her research on Vikings was "fascinating" and goes on to mention all the neat-o things she discovered. Then adds, "I would have liked to include more facts in my story but felt that too much would be boring to the reader."No, Connie. No. A good writer can incorporate all those mundane details expertly into the narrative. It has been done in books I've read in just the last few months (Becoming Marie Antoinette, Caleb's Crossing, Light a Distant Fire, for instance). Don't consider it impossible."I hope you like Viking! just the way it was presented to you."Nope. Big fat negatory. O stars.
It wasn't particularly good, really, the main character was the most fickle man I've ever had the displeasure of reading about, and the lead female too easily resigned herself to Fate. The writing was choppy at best and the flow was hard to follow, one never knew just how much time had passed between scenes which left a near permanent "Uhm what...." throughout the reading. But I started around ten and the next thing I knew the alarm was going off and it was time to get up for the day. I'm not sure if I read so hard and long because it was "Homework" or if it were more like passing an accident on the side of the road and trying not to slow down to look.It does get points, however, for not immediately making me put it down like the last three novels had done to me, so at least there's that....
What do You think about Viking! (2002)?
I normally wouldn't read stuff like this, but a friend gave it to me and promised me it would be the worst thing I ever read. How can you resist something like that??It hasn't been the worst (the worst book would be What Is the Truth?), but it IS the second worst book.The reason she gave it to me is becasue for five years, I ran my Norse-themed LARP, and thus now have a weakness of sorts for Vikings and many things Norse-related. But this....! It's so bad, I have to share: The first time he saw
—Clawfoot
Set in 850AD Thorne the Viking lands on the Isle of Man and sees a beautiful dark haired maiden bathing, she manages to escape him but he cannot get her out of his mind. He returns with more ships to capture the woman, she must be a witch to have enthralled him so badly he intends to kill her and end her spell over him. But when it comes to it he cannot do it, so he captures her and takes her home with him as his slave. Thorne is betrothed to another woman so when he brings Fiona home Bretta his intended is less than pleased. But Thorne is determined to break the spell Fiona has cast upon him. What a load of tripe this book is, Fiona is just too good to be true, Thorne like all the other men in this story blaming their own shortcomings on the women. I felt sorry for Bretta Thorne's betrothed I kept hoping her attempts to kill Fiona and Thorne would succeed, no such luck.
—Linda Sims
