The Long Ships-Fast Shipping

Description

A beloved Viking saga and masterpiece of historical fiction, The Long Ships is a high spirited adventure that stretches from Scandinavia to Spain, England, Ireland, and beyond.

Frans Gunnar Bengtsson’s The Long Ships resurrects the fantastic world of the tenthcentury AD when the Vikings roamed and rampaged from the northern fastnesses of Scandinaviadown to the Mediterranean. Bengtsson’s hero, Red Orm—canny, courageous, and aboveall lucky—is only a boy when he is abducted from his Danish home by the Vikings andmade to take his place at the oars of their dragon-prowed ships. Orm is then capturedby the Moors in Spain, where he is initiated into the pleasures of the senses andfights for the Caliph of Cordova. Escaping from captivity, Orm washes up in Ireland,where he marvels at those epicene creatures, the Christian monks, and from whichhe then moves on to play an ever more important part in the intrigues of the variousScandinavian kings and clans and dependencies. Eventually, Orm contributes to theViking defeat of the army of the king of England and returns home an off-the-cuffChristian and a very rich man, though back on his native turf new trials and tribulationswill test his cunning and determination. Packed with pitched battles and blood feudsand told throughout with wit and high spirits, Bengtsson’s book is a splendid adventurethat features one of the most unexpectedly winning heroes in modern fiction.