I hate it when a book series doesn’t make it obvious that it is part and parcel in a line of books that need to be read in order.

I read the book blurb for the doom of Odin and thought wow this sounds interesting. It was very interesting, but it was very confusing and as a reader I felt lost without the prior series information.

I felt like the writing was very in depth, requires a lot to pull out the meaningful parts. Perhaps this is also an issue I am having from jumping into this series.

Overall, I found this book, interesting but difficult without the prior knowledge. I am planning on catching up on the first two books to really get the most out of this one in a reread.

Thank you to Saint Martin Press and NetGalley for the advanced reading copy. Opinions are my own.

This is a phenomenal conclusion to a very dark but realistic trilogy of an orc. Oden keeps things very interesting, and it’s immediate as Grimnir starts dead.

The Doom of Language and Meaning

**

The first element that stands out from this summary and from the opening pages is the usage of Old English or Old Norse letters. They are not used particularly properly; for example, Miðgarðr places a ð between two consonant r’s; ð is a consonant as well that has a th sound, so this name is Mithgarthr. Before looking this up, I looked up Scott Oden (1967-), hoping that he lived in Norway, Sweeden or Finland, and perhaps these books were translated from native languages of these countries… No. Oden is an American, who only attended a community college before starting a career as a fiction writer. Oy vey. In summary, he is just using fancy Old English letters because they make him sound cool… He uses several Old Norse words in rapid succession, including: sjovaettir (a variant for spirits), Angrboda (mother of monsters in Norse mythology), skraelingr (Norse Greenlanders), Gjoll (river), Balegyr, Svadilfari (eight-legged horse), nar (corpse), and kaunr (kind). I am providing these translations; there are no notes to explain what these words mean in Old Norse in this novel. Thus, readers are likely to be extremely lost and confused by these strange references. Such confusion tends to push reviewers to just say something nice to avoid looking up what all this actually means.
The narrative seems to be designed to put the reader into a deep slumber. A memory is evoked of an “ancient ruin” and “forgotten nymphs”. There are cries and screams and shadows, and it’s all as confusing as can be. Ellipses are used to cut off thoughts and leave things unexplained. Something violent is happening as there is spitting, retching, and burning in the “killing field”. There are some good descriptions that weave together many adjectives, as in: “discs of bone, beads of scrimshaw, silver, and amber, and still-bright cylinders of gold, heavy and ancient”. But when one stops to figure out what all this description is attempting to say, or what the connecting narrative is: these questions are left unanswered.
This is just not a good novel because a good novel must invite readers into the story and has to connect ideas in adjacent sentences and paragraphs into a story. Without these connections, it does not matter how dense or meaningful individual words or phrases are as the do not cling together to make coherent meaning.

This was an interesting book to read. I enjoyed that it heavily featured Norse mythology and used Norse gods and goddesses. The Doom of Odin was a bloody, violent book. While it wasn't a put-off to me, it might be to some other people. The storyline was interesting but could be a bit hard to follow. But overall, this was a good, interesting book to read.

Third and final volume in The Grimnir Saga, The Doom of Odin begins where many tales would end. The year is 1347, and Grimnir—the last skraelingr (i.e., orc)—has doggedly tracked his nemesis to Rome, a dying city decimated by the black plague. After nearly 130 years of pursuit, it is there that he plans to fulfill his oath to destroy the resurrected wyrm Níðhöggr, Odin’s chosen weapon and the ancient enemy of Grimnir’s people. As he’s closing in on Níðhöggr’s lair, however, Grimnir is felled by a crossbow bolt loosed by a terrified mercenary. Just like that, a legendary warrior seasoned by a thousand years of battle is snuffed out by a single lucky shot.

Grimnir awakens in Nástrond, a grim realm at the base of the World Tree Yggðrasil. A dark mirror of the humans’ Valhalla, Nástrond is where Grimnir’s extinct people feast, intrigue, and brawl. The family reunion is an acrimonious one, however, as his parents, cousins, and myriad half-brothers despise him as an upstart outsider. The contempt is mutual, as Grimnir feels his fellows have strayed from Loki’s path, more concerned with social jockeying and establishing petty kingdoms than honing each other through constant warfare in preparation for Ragnarök. A treacherous ambush cuts short Grimnir’s afterlife, but while “slain” souls in Nástrond are typically revived a few hours later, Grimnir instead finds himself unceremoniously shunted back into the world of the living. Subsequent deaths catapult Grimnir back and forth between Rome and the Worlds Below, where he doggedly pursues his goals in parallel. In the world of the living, he continues his quest to destroy Níðhöggr and thwart the wyrm’s master, Odin. When in the afterlife, Grimnir strives to discover the source of his mysterious resilience and the role he is destined to play in the final battle of Ragnarök.

Norse mythology figured heavily in both A Gathering of Ravens and Twilight of the Gods. But while the gods and creatures of Scandinavian folklore were marginalized by the encroachment of Christianity in the first two volumes of The Grimnir Saga, having so much of the final book’s action take place in otherworldly realms allows Scott Oden to pull out all the stops, delivering a phantasmagorical epic packed with Scandinavian spirits and monsters. In The Doom of Odin humans are mostly anonymous rabble rather than the central characters they were previously. Instead, Grimnir finds himself struggling against the souls of his vanquished race, fey witches, undead draugar, winged murder-crones, giants, and Odin himself. While the story is consequently less grounded in our historical world than previous volumes, the cosmic elements feel like a natural escalation at this point in the narrative. Oden creates the sense that not only is Ragnarök nigh, it’s also just two steps away.

After following Grimnir’s exploits over two books as the sole surviving skraelingr, it was fascinating seeing him thrown in among his own people. Grimnir’s cocksure bravado and casual cruelty seem ubiquitous among his kind; they act like jackals, constantly circling each other, waiting for an opening to strike. While the skraelingar clearly share a certain base disposition, their personalities are given enough nuance to keep them from feeling one-dimensional. The fierce warrior woman Skaði is a special highlight, especially after seeing Grimnir mostly interact with smaller, more fragile human women in the previous books.

Even compared to the first two volumes, The Doom of Odin revels in vicious, graphic violence. Skulls are smashed and entrails are spilt, and it’s all rendered in vivid detail. Much like the story’s stakes had been raised, it felt like the brutality had been taken up a few notches as well. This wasn’t a negative point for me, if anything it created the sense that Grimnir was truly unchained for the first time, giving in to his empowering rage in a way most works of entertainment warn against. Sensitive readers might find themselves skimming some passages, however.

A minor issue I had with The Doom of Odin is that the cast of characters is considerably larger than before, and Old Norse mythological terms more frequently encountered. There were occasions when I had trouble keeping track of who some of the minor characters were, or what a given branch of the World Tree signified. It was only upon finishing the book that I discovered that a combination glossary/dramatis personae had been tucked away in the back. This appendix would have smoothed over the few rough patches in my reading journey if only the book had drawn my attention to it earlier, perhaps in a table of contents.

Packed with world-shaking events and operatic struggle, The Doom of Odin is an immensely satisfying conclusion to Grimnir’s saga. One of grimdark’s most compelling characters gets exactly the bloody send-off he deserves. Grimnir’s tale couldn’t have ended any other way.

This is the third and final adventure of Grimnir, who is… eh more or less an orc? He’s got many names, and people have many names for him. In this volume, we see the Grimnir that finally dies (oh no!), rather embarrassingly, actually. It turns out that those of his kind go to a special island called Nástrond, where they will wait for Ragnarok. As long as you’re on the island, you can die and you’ll come back to ‘life’ within a few hours. Except it’s different for Grimnir for some reason…

As with the previous novels of our grumpy protagonist, I quite enjoyed my time with Grimnir in this volume as well. I mean, get ready to be reading a lot of Norse words and pronouncing them almost certainly wrong in your head (is that just me then?). There are a lot of words here that are not of the English language but they are nonetheless words that make this book feel more… authentic?

Grimnir is grumpy as usual, and death hasn’t changed that one bit, especially since he was right in the middle of something when he died. He’s still foulmouthed and easy to anger, but it’s hard not to cheer for him anyway. So, I can say that it was easy to stay immersed in this one from beginning to end.

All told, I’d recommend this one to anyone that like viking stories, or to anyone that likes a good anti-hero in their story. A great conclusion to the Epic of Grimnir!

I thoroughly enjoyed this book once I saw I had been chosen for an arc reading I re read the first two books. This I would say is one of my favorites from Scott Oden. It followed the Twilight of the Gods and absolutely lived up to my expectations. There was such a climactic ending to the book as well. I have seen people say it’s hard to follow but I think that it is a very well planned and thorough book. It’s adult fantasy for a reason you just have to invest time and effort into really understanding the story and world building but that is absolutely worth the effort. I really enjoyed seeing Grimnir open up more to human kind and find those he liked after so long of hating humans. This book was definitely my favorite of the series

This is the third book in a brutal norse mythology infused fantasy, look at the cover, isn’t it freaking cool? Actually all the covers in this series are super cool looking. So with it being the third installment I can’t talk about too much but this is a very loved series that takes place in both midgard and the afterlife, it’s dark and brutal and it sees us with a ton of action and adventure as we follow an orc character which orc main characters already super underrated, super good!
Full review on YouTube

The Doom of Odin is book three in the The Grimnir Saga by Scott Oden.
Scott Oden delivers a truly epic story. An extremely well written fantasy.
The setting is an amazingly detailed and vividly descriptive.
This was a fun and engaging adventure. I really enjoyed the characters and thought they were very well written and developed.
I’m going to be checking book one and two out after reading this one.

Thank You NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for your generosity and gifting me a copy of this amazing eARC!

Unfortunately I can't say I liked this one as much as the other two in the series. I get that Grimnir is an anti-hero, and that he is trying to right the balance. But parts felt just too violent and angry for me. I loved the first book of the series that felt like a retelling of the Beowulf epic poem with Norse legends and extra depth. I'm conflicted about it though.

Things that really appealed to me in the story:

1. Grimnir couldn't die. Every time he died in one location, he came back in another (where he had also just died). That added intrique. That need to know what was going on. But every time Grimnir came back, he was more violent than the last time. That level of blood gore and violence really started to get to me. It was like being in the orc camp in a Tolkein book. And we know those weren't the good guys.

2. The fact that even though these really were all just a bunch of Orcs, there was still a sense of good vs. evil. Of the need to right a balance and a wrong. Just again, all the violence to get there.

However, sometimes it felt like the violence was just for the sake of violence. You could take it out and the storyline wouldn't fall apart. To me, that felt like the violence was then unnecessary. We already knew Grimnir was violent and angry. No need to see him kill and mutilate everything just to reinforce that idea. I would also have liked that final scene to have taken longer to play out. For an epic final battle scene, it wasn't very epic.

WOW. I was a huge fan of the first two books in this series, A Gathering of Ravens and Twilight of the Gods, and this final novel in the trilogy did not let me down. The Doom of Odin is an action-packed and totally engaging conclusion to the Saga of Grimnir, my favorite Orc in literature. Bloody, violent, and filled with a blend of sword-and-sorcery and beautiful, poetic language that we've rarely seen since the days of Robert E. Howard. Grimnir is dead in the opening pages of the novel, but that does not keep him from having battles and adventures in the underworld. In this trilogy, Scott Oden has given us a new epic, a new mythology that I hope will be read and enjoyed for decades to come.

Thank you for letting me ARC read the book!

While there were many aspects of the story I enjoyed I found it hard to get into and had trouble caring about the characters. That being said there will be plenty of fantasy lovers who I think will really like this book! Remeber everyone this is book THREE. So you really need to make sure you read the first two or you'll be really confused. I definitely plan on buying the book to add to my shelf regardless.

Deep and dark, this fantasy is full of battles and action. This is the third book in the series and we are getting an epic battle. I like how the series uses Norse Mythology as a point of reference to the story. Grimnir's is a big character and the writing supports him with descriptions, backstory, and action. I was easily drawn into the atmosphere of the world and both the plot and prose are impeccable. There are a lot of battles which is not my favorite thing, but the author is able to keep these sections engaging and meaningful to the story.

Thank you NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the ARC. This is my honest review.

After reading the first two books in the series, I received a beta copy of The Doom of Odin earlier this year. With my apologies for taking this long to write a review, please know that Oden has saved the best book for last in this series.

Grimnir is an orc, the last of his kind to plague Midgard. Actually he's been the last of his kind since book one where he was already nursing a centuries-old grudge. By The Doom of Odin, Grimnir's sole reason to be is to hunt down the dragon Nidhogg and get revenge for his kin.

The Doom of Odin marks one major departure from the first two books. Despite being antagonistic to humans, Grimnir has nevertheless found a few he could respect and even help a bit in the previous books. Book three is mostly set away from Midgard though, where no puny humans beg for his help. Grimnir is finally free to be Grimnir, with a no-hold-barred attitude as he challenges the biggest and baddest Norse myths can throw at him.

Oden's prose shines in this arena. The geography and the characters are deeper and darker. The plot moves forward heavy with impending threat even in the peaceful scenes. The action reads like Robert E. Howard was writing his own Norse saga. Few writers pull off fast pacing with memorable characters and complex plotlines as well as Oden does, and fewer still make the Norse myths crackle with life with such skill.

Recommended.

Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for giving me an arc of this book to read and review.

I found this book difficult to really get into. I didn’t really connect with the story or any of the characters. Nothing really kept my attention or kept me engaged. I’m not sure if it was the writing style or not. I didn’t really like the language that was used. It was hard to understand/read.

I don’t want to discredit this book because I do feel like some fantasy lovers will enjoy this book but I just wasn’t one of them. I thought it had potential but I just didn’t connect well with it.

3.5 stars!

The Doom of Odin is Book three within an ongoing series pulling heavily on Norse mythology. This installment builds well on and fully utilizes previous books world building and plot progression but can become overly complex in places leading to a reader loosing grasp of the over the narrative as a whole.

It is highly advised to read the other books preceding this one first.

The Doom of Odin is the third book in the Grimnir’s saga by Scott Oden. I’ve really enjoyed the first book, but with this one, I have to confess that I was lost in the plot. Somehow I’ve missed the second book in the series, and making sense of The Doom of Odin was a struggle. Not for the story, but for the missing pieces from the second part.
As expected, The Doom of Odin is an absorbing adventure that will take the reader to another world. So, enjoy!

This is an interesting book. It involves norse mythos and an near immortal warrior who is stalking down the nidhoggr. who is bringing plague wherever he goes. This story is dark, brutal, it involves both Midgard and the afterlife amongst the roots of Yggdrasil. It is a fascinating story which I've thoroughly enjoyed. However, there is one issue I have. This book takes place in the middle ages and before thereabouts. But there keeps on happening in the conversations between characters that use language that is far more modern.. The main character says " I like the cut of your jib" a term coined in the mid 18th century. Toerags get's thrown around a lot. It is a mid 19th century Irish slang. Itmay not bother most people but it bugged the heck out of me and kept pulling me out of the world the author was trying to create. I found that somewhat insurmountable. in reading this otherwise detailed and interesting book. .

Scott Oden’s Grimnir series has been a wonderful treat, it has everything that I look for in this type of book. I enjoyed how good everything worked together as a original story and as the third book in the series. The characters felt like they were suppose to and I always enjoy reading this. I loved the Norse elements and am excited to read more from Scott Oden.

I got 20% into this book and realised it was book 3 not book 2. So I've paused while I find and read book 2. However, I really like what I've read so far. It has a very Norse saga feel, with plenty of action and mythology. The prose itself is unusually poetic for this kind of book and I really love that. I'm looking forward to picking this up again in the near future.