The Fantasy Guide to Viking Historical Fiction
By Rebecca Wilson
Want to adventure throught the lands of the Vikings? The height of the Vikings is an amazing period of time and there is a lot of great fiction that is based on historical facts from that period and place. Rebecca Wilson has written a guide to the genre and to some of the best works in the genre.
If you are fascinated by the subject of Vikings you should check out her blog at: http://www.soulchaserbecky.blogspot.com/
You might also want to check out our Fantasy Guide to Norse Fantasy
The main features of Viking Historical fiction novels are that they of course feature Vikings whether as the main character or as the enemy in some cases, they are set historically in the Dark or Early Medieval ages in a range of countries influenced by Vikings so it's not just primarily England but also Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Iceland, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Greenland, even the far east around Istanbul (formerly known as Constantinople) can feature and of course the characters and adventures may be fictional but the true beauty of this genre is that quite often these things intertwine with genuine, real, fact historical events such as the battle of Stanford Bridge in 1066, the discovery of Iceland and Greenland or even the presence of Norse warriors in the old Holy Roman Empire as the Emperors guard.
Most novels of this genre primarily feature a group of Viking warriors who are raiders so it allows the reader to follow them in their encounters in different countries and experience how they interacted with different cultures, not just in battles but also as traders.
The characters are usually male but some strong female characters can appear but are never present through the whole book as the main characters are. Some characters from Old Norse sagas can appear such as Grettir the Strong in Iceland but also key historical figures can occur such as Harald Sigurdsson, Knut the Great or Guthrum before he was christened and renamed Athelstan.
Time in these novels can vary; if it is a trilogy which most often is they can span from the beginning of the Viking era to its end in 1066 or be focused around the end. The time period that passes in the book can be a decade or so but usually in the height of the Viking era and usually around the time of the many great invasions of England.
These books do vary in audience as well some can be found for young adults/teenagers but the majority are also for adults due to the obvious brutal and bloody scenes which feature in such fiction.
More Reviews of Viking Historical Novels:
The Raven and The Wolf - Read a review of this book here Raven, Blood Eye
Feasting the Wolf
Odinn's Child: The Heroes of the North Live On (Viking Trilogy) (No. 1)
We have a review of the three books in this series right here
The Whale Road
The Last Kingdom (The Saxon Chronicles Series #1) by Bernard Cornwell
Wolf Cry 
About Rebecca
Want to adventure throught the lands of the Vikings? The height of the Vikings is an amazing period of time and there is a lot of great fiction that is based on historical facts from that period and place. Rebecca Wilson has written a guide to the genre and to some of the best works in the genre.If you are fascinated by the subject of Vikings you should check out her blog at: http://www.soulchaserbecky.blogspot.com/
You can follow her on Twitter @soulchaserbecky.
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