Odin's Ravens (Blackwell Pages, #2)

by K.L. Armstrong and M.A. Marr

[Melanie]

3.5 stars

Review originally posted at RabidReads.com.

As a general rule, I’m not a huge fan of young adult books, so I was really surprised when I decided to pick up Loki’s Wolves back in 2013. I’m a huge Kelley Armstrong fan, so I decided to give it a try. I’ve never read Melissa Marr, who is the other author on this series. I also liked the idea of the Norse mythology. While it is written for younger children, I still found the story interesting. We have a group of thirteen year old kids from South Dakota who are standing in for the Norse gods, Thor, Loki, Balder, Odin, Frey and Freya. They are all working together to stop Ragnarok. They are even getting powers of the gods.

In Odin’s Ravens, we pick up basically where Loki’s Wolves left off. Baldwin, the descendant of Balder, has been poisoned and Matt Thorsen, descendant of Thor, along with Fen and Laurie, who are cousins and descendants of Loki all make a trip to Hel to bring Baldwin back from the dead. While there, they must face monsters and convenience Fen and Laurie’s “Aunt Helen” the guardian of Hel, to let them leave with Baldwin. After that, they meet with the Valkyries (I so wish these Valkyries were more like Kresley Cole’s, but then I guess this wouldn’t be a middle grade book anymore then would it?) and are put on a quest to find Mjölnir, Thor’s hammer.

The characters in this story are well written, as if with Kelley Armstrong there was ever any doubt. The kids make mistakes that kids their age would make. They get upset with themselves for making the mistakes when they figure out what happened. There is a lot on these kids shoulders, but overall they do handle things really well, while still being young teenagers.

This story is a typical quest type story. As soon as they complete one task, they are set up another. The mythology is great. I don’t know a lot about Norse mythology (outside of the comic books), but it seems to researched extremely well. It is also told in a way that explains the stories really well, especially for the age group for which it is written.

I think the storyline is really good, if you can get over the idea of thirteen-year-old kids as stand-ins for gods and are forced to fight to stop the apocalypse. It is a book written for middle school kids and they want to read about kids their age, so it makes sense. I believe that this is a trilogy and that the last book, Thor’s Serpents will wrap of the story. I can’t wait to see how it ends. I would highly recommend this book for kids, boys and girls alike. I do recommend that you start at the beginning of the series with Loki’s Wolves.