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Published April 2009 

Vimp the Viking's Epic Voyage by Peter L Ward
Illustrated by Steve Crisp
Trafford Publishing 2009  £6.99

Outline and quotes

Young teenagers Vimp and Freya defy their elders when it comes to established Viking customs.  Vimp and his apprentice shipwrights have no intention of taking weapon instruction once their funeral longboat is built.  They don't want to train as warriors and plunderers of other people's possessions.  It's teenage rebellion on a big scale; peace not war and very unViking.

Chapter 5 Warrior Training - excerpt

'Outside the Weapons Centre stood the most feared Viking warrior of all.  The boys trembled at the gigantic figure of Olaf Skullcrusher, a legend in his own lifetime.  Olaf towered over the motley crew, his fierce, dark eyes blazing through the visor of his war helmet.
In one gnarled fist, he gripped a steel sword whose jagged edges bore witness to the battles he'd won.  In the other, he grasped a mighty wooden club whose name was known to all villagers.  This was 'Nutcracker' and Olaf boasted that more than two hundred enemies had fallen to its ferocious swing.  Which was curious as he couldn't count.  He generally forgot to mention that most of his victims were peaceful farmers and fishermen who'd only tried to protect their loved ones.
Olaf had a particular hatred of the Saxon English peoples on the other side of the sea.  He'd plundered many a coastal village and monastery and regularly returned to the Land of the Vikings burdened with treasure and the spoils of war.  He surveyed the miserable bunch of frightened apprentices cringing at his feet.
"You're late!" he thundered, raising his bushy eyebrows.
This wasn't true.  If anything, the boys were early. 
"That means no lunch break," he continued.  "If there's anything I can't abide it's lazy varmints who can't get out of bed on time in the morning.  No lunch, I say!"
He thrust his sword into its massive sheath and grabbed a chicken leg from a bag tied round his middle.  To the horror of the watching boys he devoured it whole, bones and all.
"Now!" he said, spitting odd bits of chicken over the front row of recruits and wiping his greasy hand on his orange beard.  "Follow me and I'll learn you your first lesson."

Freya is an a different league.  Grand-daughter of the ailing former village Chieftain, Freya enjoys a privileged position in the community.  It seems she possesses special powers although only vaguely aware of their potency.  Despite her high-born background, Freya's best friend is English slave captive, Emma.  To her dismay she learns that Emma will be sacrificed when her grand-father dies and her body lain with his, in the funeral boat.  There's only one way out.  They must escape the village and get away.  When the apprentices learn of the awful event they throw in their lot with the girls and plan a mass exodus.  All they need is a boat...and they've just built one!

Chapter Seven  Freya weaves her Magic - excerpt

The boat rose onto the crest of a gigantic wave before pitching down the other side.  Now, the fearful rowers fought for their lives.  They had no time to be frightened.  Putting their backs into the work they pulled hard as the mountainous wave crashed into the boat and threatened to plunge it to the bottom.  Then Lief saw something that convinced him he was losing his mind.  High on the raised prow of the new vessel, the ghostly form of a young maiden appeared.  She was clothed in pale green and her slim outline glowed.  Other maidens joined her to dance on the waves, twisting and twirling in the teeth of the gale.  The ship filled with ethereal green light.  To Lief, it seemed that these extraordinary figures were mocking the strenuous efforts of his oarsmen.
A second crackle of lightning fizzed at the raging surface of the sea and Lief was dismayed to find that his oarsmen had ceased rowing.  From the startled expression on their frozen faces he worked out they'd seen something dreadful.  Following the direction of their glazed eyes, he turned to see the monstrous, bearded face of an old man rising from the waves.  Sea water streamed from his huge skull and trailing wisps of beard swirled in the turbulent waters.  He spoke in a tumultuous voice, drowning out the whine of the wind.
"Who are you that dare set out upon my ocean?" he cried.  "You have seen my daughters dance around your vessel.  Once you see my wave maidens, your end is very near.  No living creature has survived such a vision."
He reached out with enormous hands, each the size of the ship, and his claw-like fingers closed over the mast.
"With these hands," he thundered, "I plunge you to the depths of my Kingdom!"

 The youngsters hardly know how to navigate, let alone cope with furious deities and storms.  A feature of the Viking Age was marauding pirates out to attack any ship worth attention.  There's no way Vimp and the oarsmen are going to outrun the large sail bearing down from the horizon.

 Chapter Nine  Pirate Attack - excerpt

An explosion of vulgar laughter rocked the pirate ship but the cruel smile on Foulbeard's face faded.   He snapped a short order to his men to move up alongside the funeral boat.  As the pirates pulled at their oars, Freya stepped up and stood shoulder to shoulder with the boys.
"Stop, Foulbeard Brute of the Waves!" she commanded. "Pull away or I, Freya, will make you regret every disrespectful word you have spoken!"
The bullish pirate captain gawped at Freya then bowed low.  "So, the little lady speaks!" he said.  "She's ordering the nasty pirate captain to row away empty handed, is she?"
His ingratiating smile turned to a black scowl.
"Foulbeard Brute of the waves is about to teach you and your companions pirate manners.  When he's done, you'll wish you'd never been born."
He looked back at his men who eagerly followed each word.
"Boarding party...ready with your weapons..."
They were the last words Foulbeard spoke upon the high seas.  Freya, hair blowing in straggling strands, raised her slender arms above her head.  Very slowly, she lowered them, palms outwards.  Her eyes flashed as she spoke into the wind.  The sea beyond the two Viking vessels seethed and boiled.  Shouts of dismay went up from the pirate boat.  Unable to flex a muscle, the young travellers in the funeral boat sat bolt upright.  Foulbeard clung onto the dragon-headed prow and gazed at the horrifying spectacle emerging from the churning waves.
"Iormungandr, Serpent of the World," Freya called, "arise from the unfathomable depths of your ocean floor.  Show no mercy to these mortals who bring evil into other men's lives.  Take them back to the dark and freezing places beneath the Earth.  And there, let them perish."

The adventure continues.  Becalmed in thick North Sea fog, the crew is shown the way to the Saxon shore by a school of dolphins.  But there's no welcome party as the exhausted crew drag their boat up the beach.  Inspired by the example of King Alfred the local Anglo-Saxons are hidden, ready to do battle.  
A small group of the young Vikings ventures into the nearby forest where they're captured by an alert Saxon patrol.  The game is up.  But there's double trouble when a fully armed Viking raider appears in the bay, threatening the party back at the boat.
Freya resorts not to her magical powers but something more human - the power of beautiful music, an anathema to the loutish warriors manning the oars.  This is Freya's final act before her inexplicable disappearance.

Vimp the Viking's Epic Journey  is more than a rip-roaring story for boys and girls.  History and legend intersperse with issues relevant to the present-day.  The crew, landing on the East coast, are asylum seekers.   
The story challenges the commonly held 'barbaric' view of Vikings.  Whilst brutal violence played an awesome role in many conquests, most Vikings led uneventful, family lives as farmers or fishermen.  Others worked in skilled trades or crafts.    
The young heroes of the tale value civility, unimpressed by prospect of plunder and theft in foreign lands.

NOW IN PREPARATION:

Freya and the Fenris-Wolf  The 40000 word sequel to Vimp the Viking's Epic Voyage

PUBLISHED  November 2008

From all good book shops, Amazon, Cambridge University Press (CUP) and Natural History Museum South Kensington