Shadow of the Gods is one of those books that drew me too it from the quality of the cover alone. A tiny dot of a warrior faces down the mountainous dragon, the sheer scale of the monstrosity in comparison to the human breathtaking. Norse fantasy is usually a good time too, so I was onboard from the start.

What I will say is that the moment to moment writing is of a good quality and really draws the reader along. The main characters all feel distinctive with clear and powerful motivations, and the worldbuilding is interesting. What struck me though was how much the book was trying to achieve overall. We have three PoV character, all of which are completely separate, each with their own cast of characters and narratives they are following. I felt like Gwynn was just constantly trying to edge me. So many times a chapter would start picking up and I’d become massively invested just to end and swing across to an unrelated event, and the three characters meant it could be several chapters before you return to that particular PoV.

One PoV narrative was quite distinct, but the other two both followed separate war bands. Two similar groups with sizeable casts of named characters each made it take me a good way into the book before I’d really got to grips with who was who, muddying the lines of the narrative for the first half.

The book is very much a setup for the trilogy and doesn’t have its own conclusion, ending in a cliffhanger for the next book. It looks a fairly chunky book, but since we follow three separate stories until the final few chapters, it is functionally three much smaller books, all of which feel like they only just hit cruising speed y the end. I enjoyed it, and it left me wanting more, but it was also kind of unfulfilling. I have hopes that the completed trilogy will be great, but this book as a stand alone experience was just a chapter by chapter case of blue-balls.

7.5/10