Odd and the Frost Giants back

A delightful tale reprising known Norse mythology under a new guise, and another of those children's books which will overwhelming be picked up and relished here by adults.

Odd is the son of a Scottish mother who loves to sing and a Viking father who stole her away during a particularly fine day's pillaging. Confounding readers' expectations they did actually end up loving each other for his father waited until she understood enough of their language to clearly state his intentions. Unfortunately he died at sea. When told the news Odd merely shrugged. It was this unpredictability - he had a knowing smile too - which unnerved his settlement, but when without supervision he misused his father's larger axe to try to chop down a tree and it ended up crippling him... then he truly became an outcast. So during an unnaturally long winter when the ice and snow refused to soften, when tempers were high and his step-father got drunk, Odd decided he'd sever his few ties completely and retreat to his father's log cabin deep in the heart of the forest. And it's there that he meets a flame-coloured fox, a voracious bear and an eagle with only one eye...

Readers of Neil Gaiman's SANDMAN, his American Gods novel and indeed of Matt Fraction's THOR will love this reprise of three of Neil's favourite characters. Indeed I do wonder if this was the idea he had when considering THOR before Straczynski took up the reins. That would have been interesting, as indeed it is here. The illustrations by Brett Helquist did nothing for me, but they're scant in the first place and then I just skipped them in favour of finding out what was going to lie behind Odd's next smile.