Who's Afraid of Beowulf?

Hilary Frderickssen is a young American archaeologist with a passion for Vikings. A Viking ship burial is discovered on the site she is excavating in northern Scotland. When Hildy investigates, she gets a shock when she discovers that the Vikings on board the ship are still very much alive. King Hrolf of Caithness and his followers have been awoken from their thousand-year sleep to fight the evil Sorcerer King who rules his evil empire from an office block in London. Hildy has the daunting task of providing the Vikings with food, clothing, and transport, and helping them get to London to find the Sorcerer-King. There are some very funny incidents as she introduces them to the delights of fish and chips and Marks and Spencers suits. While Hildy accompanies the King and some of the Vikings to London, the ones remaining behind in Caithness kidnap Danny Baker, a hapless TV producer, and hold him hostage.This is a very funny book, with a clever plot and lots of amusing incidents and characters. The Vikings are a delightful bunch, especially Starkadd the Berserker ("like honey, thick and sweet")and Hildy is an engaging heroine. There are also two cthonic spirits, Zerxx and Perxx, who live off energy and are involved in playing a mysterious and complex game called Goblin's Teeth, which seems to be a blending of chess, scrabble, monopoly, snakes and ladders and any other game you can think of. I have read lots of Tom Holt's other books, but I don't like any of them nearly as much as this one.

Who's Afraid of Beowulf? Sure, it's a catchy title, but I'm afraid that it is misleading. Beowulf is not a character in the story, but he's mentioned about 3 times. Despite Beowulf's absence, this book is still pretty good. Tom Holt treats us to an interesting cast of characters that drive or walk around London or Caithness. There's the cameraman, who keeps saying, "This is like that time in (name of place) where such and such happened." There are two electron-like entities called Prexz and Zxerp, who have nothing better to do than play board games. Then there's the Vikings that Hildy Fredericks-daughter discovers. And together they vow to rid the world of a sorcerer that has managed to stay alive for several hundred years. This is a pretty decent parody on Vikings and fantasy. It's not so much that Tom Holt has funny scenes, but he has interesting characters, that make this book enjoyable. Unlike some parodies I've read, the end of this book is very satisfying and won't leave you hanging.

Archaeologist Hildy Frederiksen has always wanted to make a major discovery and an intact Viking ship burial certainly fits the bill. She most definitely does *not* expect the dead Vikings to come back to life and is understandably rattled when they do. It seems a thousand years ago King Rolf Earthstar of Caithness, ('God forsaken place but it is my Kingdom') and his band of heroes fought a dreadful battle with the evil Sorceror King, won the battle but lost track of their enemy and so found it necessary to do a 'King Arthur' that is put themselves into an enchanted sleep to wake when they are needed to destroy the Sorceror King once and for all. Thus Hildy finds herself the dazed and bewildered guide to an unflappable King Rolf and his bickering band of heroes as they make their way southward to confront the Enemy in his new stronghold, London. Absolutely hilarious.

There are many stories and sagas which tell how the Hero or king will return again if needed, but this story is surprisingly good. The returning Norse heros have no trouble with modern technology, they just equate it with old norse magical effects and abilities! With the help of an archeologist (Grave Robber) the old norse king returns to fight the evil sorcerer (Computer Magnate) whom he has vowed to defeat. The fun starts as the boatload of heros has to deal with being an archological find, and continues as they sort out all the technological wonders of the 20th century including television, modern warfare, and computers! After reading "Expecting Someone Taller" I looked for other titles by Tom Holt and was not disappointed by this outrageous romp. Highly reccommended!

The first thing that strikes me is that I find the plot similar to "Flying Dutch", but while I continue to read this comic viking-tale, I change opinion. In Caithness, an old grave is uncovered, and the vikings are awaken. They main concern when first awaken, is who's responsible it was to pack the food, and who have had the nerve to move their ladder so they couldn't get out of the ship. After they sorted these important things out they start the plans for their quest; how to assassin the sorcerer-king. To their help they have the archeologist Hildy Fredriksen, who had the pleasure(?) to bump into them. The adventure starts and consists of several amusing incidents; Hildy's more or less fortunate attempts to keep the vikings from attacking the natives, Chthonic sprits getting drunk on high-voltage electricity, and more... I like this book a lot, the vikings fighting spirit never cease to exist, they are always happy when there is an opportunity to get involved in a battlement (beware SAS!). The book isn't that 'complciated' that I found 'Ye Gods!', can be the fact that I don't know to much about mythology (which is very much involved in 'Ye Gods!') that make me prefer 'Whos Afraid of Beowulf' If you found 'Flying Dutch' amusing, then I promise you that you will like this one as well, if you havn't read Flying Dutch, I would recommend that you read this one first, that way you'll have fun reading 'Whos afraid...' and even more fun reading 'Flying Dutch' (that's still one of my favorites).