Under the fiery Middle Eastern sun, two enemy worlds collide.JARL, a powerful Viking leader, returns to the rich lands near the Caspian Sea at the helm of his magnificent new longship, The Treasure Huntress. His forces cut a wide swath through the land, taking everything of value-capturing or killing any who stand in their way.NENA, daughter of a regional war-chief, is an accomplished warrior in … in her own right. Proud, strong and fiercely disciplined, her tribe has dominated the territory for centuries, and they fear no opponent-certainly not the beast-like, invading Northmen. In the smoldering aftermath of a grueling battle, they find themselves in unfamiliar positions-Nena as a captive-Jarl wanting something he cannot have. A fierce clash of wills ensues. Torn between passion and prejudice, conviction and taboo, love and obligation, each is forced to question everything they knew and everything they were sure they wanted. But realizing their heart’s true desire is not enough. Their people are still mortal enemies. To be together they must be willing to sacrifice everything-even their lives. Nena, the first book in The Treasure Huntress series, is an intense, riveting adventure of power, passion, and love.
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Ann Boelter is an excellent writer. NENA is well-researched, fast-paced, intriguing, and a genuinely fascinating book. NENA is the first in The Viking Treasure Huntress series. Read the Prologue and you won’t be able to put the book down until finished. EnJOY! The second in the series is coming out soon.
Welcome to Throwback Thursday my fellow Book Dragons, our last for this year. And we are going far back. The end of the 9th Century, in fact. This Gem is quite beautiful, like a piece of Aquamarine held in the light of a sky just after a storm. It glows a silken, shimmering blue-green. When you clutch it in your claw you can feel the power of destiny vibrating from it, what does it hold for you? Adventure? Romance? Treasure? Danger? All of them? This Gem is “Nena” by Gem Maker Ann Boelter.
“Nena” starts out on the south coast of Norway. There a great Long Ship is commissioned. It is built by a man, but it’s bow is designed by a woman. It is incredible it’s design. Tall, foreboding, intimidating, it will terrify it’s Master’s enemies. It will be a Dragon (wonderful, isn’t it) but each individual scale will be special, for it will not be a regular dragon scale, but each will have the attribute of a different animal and takes it power from it. The agility of an eel, the swiftness of a bird, the strength of a bear. No, this will be no ordinary ship and it’s Master, no ordinary Master.
Jarl is his name and his plan is to travel the world taking treasure and plunder wherever he goes. He is a Viking. He will not relent. He has a plan to make himself rich and powerful and he is determined to fulfill it. He sails away from the coast on his new ship The Treasure Huntress and begins to do what Vikings were known for – taking plunder, capturing or killing all those who stood in their way. It was not for nothing that in churches across the coasts of Europe their prayers included the line, ” From the wrath of the Northmen, O Lord, deliver us ” .
But then after a fierce battle and the capture and pillage of a people not easily taken, he finds himself captivated by a warrior, Nena. He wants what he cannot have. She begins to want him in return…aaaanddd…this is where I put the book down for a moment and crossed my claws..because normally this is where Viking fiction becomes a real downer for me. Everything gets Hollywood-ish. Suddenly he’s going ga-ga..she takes over. It’s mad, passionate, explicit sex for pages and pages and it gets boring and I lose interest. Insert tea and biscuits here, played with the puppies here – when you are a dragon 47 pound dogs count as puppies – and then braced myself and picked the book back up… continued reading. And wouldn’t you know it… I WAS WRONG! Ann Boelter absolutely deserved every single kudo and award she has gotten for this book. I care about these characters. I want to see them survive and thrive. I want to see what comes next.
I loved this book. I have studied Vikings. My ancestors were models for some of those wonderful ships and shields, you know. Boelter gets it right. The surroundings, food, clothes, transport, weaponry. She even makes the conversations plausible because the dialogue is not over done. Communication is a very difficult thing to get right as one goes back in time and she makes it seem fluid. Her secondary characters are waiting to be fleshed out more, but this is a three part series so I would expect that we will see some of them again in the future.
If you are in search of a good, old fashioned Viking romp, where no punches are pulled and the Vikings are allowed to be Vikings, this is the book for you. If you have read incidents like ‘A Viking Burial’ in Faber’s Book of Reportage, this is the book for you. This is book is very reasonably price in paperback, and the cover is magnificent. It is also currently free on Kindle Unlimited.
Until tomorrow, this is your humble Book Dragon, Drakon T. Longwitten