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Worth Fighting For
A romance novella based on Norse Mythology.
Being a mortal married to a Norse god isn't easy. Nanna and Baldur's marriage is on the rocks, and it gets worse when Baldur leaves without explanation. With the Draugr coming to attack the village and death coming for the two of them, Nanna does whatever she can to get to Asgard in an attempt to save her village, their lives, and hopefully, their marriage.
Being a mortal married to a Norse god isn't easy. Nanna and Baldur's marriage is on the rocks, and it gets worse when Baldur leaves without explanation. With the Draugr coming to attack the village and death coming for the two of them, Nanna does whatever she can to get to Asgard in an attempt to save her village, their lives, and hopefully, their marriage.
94 pages, Kindle Edition
Published February 2, 2020
28 people want to read
About the author
Chesney Infalt
16 books87 followersI've been writing since I was six years old. Those stories won't ever see the light of day (hopefully), but I have others that I'm willing to share with the world.
Happy reading!
Happy reading!
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
January 24, 2022
I want to start by saying that if you really know your Norse mythology and history this novella is probably going to make you a little bit cranky.
What I liked
The concept of Nanna being human rather than a goddess herself is an interesting take.
I liked the Huldra. I wish that whole sequence was developed a little more.
I like the ending, which of course deviates heavily from the myth. It's a much happier ending, which I appreciate.
The things I thought were meh
I have mixed feelings on the Seeress and how seiðr is portrayed. That the trance state of seiðr was induced with burning herbs is one theory, sure, but I feel like more really could have been done with this. That Nanna just induces a future-seeing trance while on the back of a horse, without the herbs that were previously established as necessary, felt a little unlikely. The word völva is applied to Nanna later but not to the Seeress initially, which I thought was strange.
The whole eye of Odin thing was a bit meh. It was a sort of cool use of a random tidbit of the mythology, but it felt like wasted potential. It didn't really play into the plot as much as I'd hoped.
What were the things that attacked Nanna and her friends in the cave? I don't think that was ever explained, so that's frustrating.
And now for the things I didn't like.
Buckle up, because I really, really like my Norse mythology and because this is written as something of a straight retelling there's a couple deviations from the myths that I found frustrating.
My first question is... what's with the Frigg erasure? Freya definitely is not the mother of Baldur in any of the Scandinavian or Icelandic sources that I'm aware of it. It's a change that just makes zero sense to me.
The second deviation from myth that really bugged me was having Freya just flippantly tell Loki about the mistletoe. It struck me as an odd choice. Frigg (who is not Freya in the source this myth comes from) is generally portrayed as a wise character in myth. For example, that one time she 100% tricked Odin to win a bet. Loki had to disguise himself as an old woman and trick the information out of her. Frigg would not have trusted Loki of all people with information that could kill her son. She just wouldn't have. So that was an odd choice to me. It would have been fun to see more of Loki being Loki.
The whole thing about Odin choosing Freya over Hel to be his wife made me facepalm. Hel is Loki's daughter and Loki and Odin have a complicated relationship and... just no. I think there was probably a better excuse to be had. Especially since they did actually send Hermod in the myth. And that leads to my next point.
I don't like the demonization of Hel here. In myth she welcomed Baldur and Nanna (who died right after him) with hospitality fit for a king and queen. Further, she was at least moderately compassionate. I found this bitter, bored, and somewhat sadistic take disappointing.
Final Thoughts
I actually wish this had strayed further from the myth (or completely divorced from it into a new fantasy setting) because I think the changes that were already made would have been less frustrating. It also suffered from being too short. There were a lot of ideas and plot points that could have done with more fleshing out. I wish we'd seen more of Nanna and Baldur's relationship before he left so the stakes would have felt higher. Ditto the village. By the end I'd practically forgotten about the village and really didn't care about it one way or the other.
Also, what on earth happened to land them with a horde of draugr coming after the village? If that was explained I missed it. But... men don't become draugr for nothing, ya know?
Honestly, I think the author could have gotten a whole novel out of this. I genuinely feel like I needed more story.
What I liked
The concept of Nanna being human rather than a goddess herself is an interesting take.
I liked the Huldra. I wish that whole sequence was developed a little more.
I like the ending, which of course deviates heavily from the myth. It's a much happier ending, which I appreciate.
The things I thought were meh
I have mixed feelings on the Seeress and how seiðr is portrayed. That the trance state of seiðr was induced with burning herbs is one theory, sure, but I feel like more really could have been done with this. That Nanna just induces a future-seeing trance while on the back of a horse, without the herbs that were previously established as necessary, felt a little unlikely. The word völva is applied to Nanna later but not to the Seeress initially, which I thought was strange.
The whole eye of Odin thing was a bit meh. It was a sort of cool use of a random tidbit of the mythology, but it felt like wasted potential. It didn't really play into the plot as much as I'd hoped.
What were the things that attacked Nanna and her friends in the cave? I don't think that was ever explained, so that's frustrating.
And now for the things I didn't like.
Buckle up, because I really, really like my Norse mythology and because this is written as something of a straight retelling there's a couple deviations from the myths that I found frustrating.
My first question is... what's with the Frigg erasure? Freya definitely is not the mother of Baldur in any of the Scandinavian or Icelandic sources that I'm aware of it. It's a change that just makes zero sense to me.
The second deviation from myth that really bugged me was having Freya just flippantly tell Loki about the mistletoe. It struck me as an odd choice. Frigg (who is not Freya in the source this myth comes from) is generally portrayed as a wise character in myth. For example, that one time she 100% tricked Odin to win a bet. Loki had to disguise himself as an old woman and trick the information out of her. Frigg would not have trusted Loki of all people with information that could kill her son. She just wouldn't have. So that was an odd choice to me. It would have been fun to see more of Loki being Loki.
The whole thing about Odin choosing Freya over Hel to be his wife made me facepalm. Hel is Loki's daughter and Loki and Odin have a complicated relationship and... just no. I think there was probably a better excuse to be had. Especially since they did actually send Hermod in the myth. And that leads to my next point.
I don't like the demonization of Hel here. In myth she welcomed Baldur and Nanna (who died right after him) with hospitality fit for a king and queen. Further, she was at least moderately compassionate. I found this bitter, bored, and somewhat sadistic take disappointing.
Final Thoughts
I actually wish this had strayed further from the myth (or completely divorced from it into a new fantasy setting) because I think the changes that were already made would have been less frustrating. It also suffered from being too short. There were a lot of ideas and plot points that could have done with more fleshing out. I wish we'd seen more of Nanna and Baldur's relationship before he left so the stakes would have felt higher. Ditto the village. By the end I'd practically forgotten about the village and really didn't care about it one way or the other.
Also, what on earth happened to land them with a horde of draugr coming after the village? If that was explained I missed it. But... men don't become draugr for nothing, ya know?
Honestly, I think the author could have gotten a whole novel out of this. I genuinely feel like I needed more story.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 8, 2020
This was a good quick read. I liked the Norse mythology.
October 20, 2021
For a novella this had a good message to the story. I wish though, that there was a little more depth in it or something in the beginning that connected Baldur and Nanna more so that I would have been more invested from the start. And too, I thought the fact Baldur just left and didn't do much to make it up to Nanna kinda sucked. I mean, he did do a redeeming thing towards the end, but I would of liked to of seen him try to make amends before that. Also, the battle scene felt a little rushed. I know novellas aren't always perfect, but this one did have some decent potential. Overall I'm giving it 3 solid stars.
June 22, 2022
Didn’t take me long to read, kind of bummed about that I wanted more. A god married a mortal it was a good love story, but I wanted more romance. But overall it was a good book I enjoyed reading it. ☺️
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews