My Fair Viking, by Sandra Hill
The captain is everything a Viking warrior should be -- tall, fierce, blond, and curved in all the right places. Hold it -- curved in all the right places? That's right. This Viking captain, Tyra, is a woman, and a lovely one at that. For years her height and strength and sharp tongue have daunted any Norseman with marriage on his mind. But now, faced with her ailing father's vow that her sisters (all smaller, sweeter, and younger than she) will remain maidens until Tyra weds, the bold captain decides it's time to find herself a husband. That's when she meets Adam the Healer, the twofold answer to this maiden's prayers. The skilled physician can use his expertise to cure her father, and Tyra's more than willing for the tall, handsome man to warm her marriage bed as well. There's just one problem. It seems that Adam isn't inclined to take orders from anyone.... But Tyra isn't the first Viking captain to kidnap a likely-looking mate -- though even she admits it's generally the groom who wears the armor on such occasions. My Fair Viking is fun and fast-paced -- and, when Adam finally realizes what he's being offered, things get even funnier and faster.
It is hard to describe everything that's wrong with My Fair Viking, (the book that the Chronicler, the Anthropologist and the Balance ended up reading one day) but the Chronicler will valiantly try. These points are roughly – very roughly – organised in terms of their jarring and irritating nature.
Adam's Priority Chart
The characters have very bizarre priorities that boggle the mind and strips the reader of any sense of sympathy for them. What is more jarring is the way Sandra Hill seems utterly oblivious to the phenomenon of her characters behaving like... well, bastards.
Adam realises his calling in the field of medicine as he, at the age of ten, watches in amazement at his stepmother-to-be help a woman give birth (by making "a small cut in the place between her woman-folds"). He decides that it was his destiny to become a doctor and that was that.
(The use of the word "doctor" is jarring in and of itself, as it wasn't until late 14th century that it was used to mean a medical doctor rather than a learned man or teacher - some four hundred years after when this book is set.)
Of course, the hold this destiny has on him is weak, at best, as at the death of his sister, Adela, he decides he to give up medicine forever: "One thing is certain. No longer will I answer to the name of healer. I am forswearing medicine." He says this as he cradles his dead sister (he seems to care little for his step-parents) and as hundreds more lie dying around him. Now, I understand that he's really distraught and that his sister means a lot to him. However, it seems callous to the point of inhumanity that Adam could just walk away from these people dying of the wasting sickness.
Over and over, the sufferers called for Adam and his healing skills, but he had nothing left to give.
I could but assume he's collapsing out of exhaustion, but how about tomorrow and the day after? It's an epidemic. "The toll in lives thus far was horrible to contemplate," we're told. Doesn't Adam want to anything about it? If he went into medicine for more selfish reasons (like a fascination with the subject) rather than a desire to help people, it might have been more sympathetic, but now it seems only to highlight his lack of conviction and the sheer shallowness of his calling. He doesn't doubt his skill in healing or find it traumatic to deal with patients... he just stops, abandoning hundreds to their fate. He doesn't even try to console himself that there are monks and priests aplenty to deal with the dying, or that most are too far gone to be tended and need divine intervention and peace rather than a healer. He spares not a single thought or a smidgen of guilt to " the rows of pallets where dozens of people lay sick and dying of the wasting disease" when he renounces medicine.
(Incidentally, not to undermine the tragedy, but 27 really isn't that young for a woman to be dying in the early middle ages. Considering the very real threat of death that comes with pregnancy. Another question is why in the world isn't she married? Was she really that ugly? Also, we never find out why Adela was still in Jorvik when the epidemic hit, since most rich people knew to evacuate to the country when things look a bit sickly. Rain, "far-famed healer", may have felt compelled to stay, but Adela could have left.)
Arguably this isn't exactly distant from the expensive and elite medieval physicians that Adam may have been modelled on. University-educated and very rare, a physician could only be afforded by the very rich during the middle ages. Most simply sought out the local midwife, monks, nuns, folk healers and saints, which were cheaper and more widespread. But then, as pointed out, his calling was to heal and not to covet.
"Don't you want to know about my father's illness… so that you may be prepared to cure him when we arrive at Stoneheim?"
"Why should I inquire about his symptoms when I do not intend to treat him?"
Even as Tyra kidnaps him in hopes that he will save her father, Adam maintains that he has renounced medicine and he would do the dying comatose man no good, which at least shows he is committed to his cause and will not be swayed by tales of dying men. However, when Tyra is shot in the behind with an arrow (really, really stupid slapstick, I refer you to that section), Adam offers to remove it and Tyra is shocked and horrified at the concept.
"Nay, I do not want you touching any part of my body, and certainly not that part. Besides, I thought you had given up medicine."
"For this, I would be willing to make an exception." He was still grinning, but he meant it. For a view of her naked backside, he would do just about anything.
This exchange undermines any credulity that Adam has as a virtuous and selfless healer. He is later reluctant to treat the many who flock to Stoneheim to be healed by him, but leaps to the chance of seeing Trya's ass. It really isn't encouraging or endearing an action. It seems to show that he puts the chance of seeing an attractive ass above his solemn vow to his dead sister on his list of priorities, which is above healing the sick and weak. I would really be more suspicious of a man who's more concerned with seeing ass than healing head wounds.
More work for him, though, he presumed.
At the sight of the dying, all Adam could think of is that. More work for him to do. More bodies to operate on. He doesn't even wonder at the attack or what may have transpired.
Even Adam's book, his great legacy, he forgets soon after he puts down his quill.
More on Medieval Medicine and Midwives
The thing that enthralled Adam was what Rain was doing inside the hut. She was a healer, apparently. Not just a midwife, as some old crones were, but an actual trained physician.
I hated every word of that sentence. Mostly because the likelihood of Adam having seen "an actual trained physician" in his lifetime to know what one looked like is unlikely to the point of impossible. Him being a street urchin and physicians being part of the elite. In the 13th century, there were only 3 in all of Worchester. Secondly, counting on Adam's ingrained medieval misogyny in later chapters, women were never physicians. They were midwives, folk healers and nuns, but not physicians as a physician implies a university education (that was where the training comes from) and that required one to be male. A woman being a physician is about as preposterous as her joining the Varangian Guard – an idea that Adam finds so ludicrous he laughs for hours. Literally.
Of course, he might not have meant university-trained with those words, but rather some sort of folk healer, but then, what would the difference be? Both were trained as apprentices by masters, so it seems bizarre to privilege one over the other. Especially insulting is the way midwives are described as "just a midwife" and described as old crones. Where is he getting this inane prejudice from?
And how many times has the young boy seen midwives at work? Did he think Rain wasn't one simply because she wasn't old and ugly? How did he know most midwives didn't work with such magical efficiency? Episiotomies were first used in the 18th century, so is rather anachronistic in and of itself, but on top of all that, it also seems odd that Rain comes from the 20th century where the practice has been falling out of use and questioned since the 1960s.
The Cheerleader Attitude
"Cheerleaders" is what Mrs Giggles calls them in her review, and I think it's a good term for what the character do. They are all – yes, all of them, from Tyra's sisters to Adam's uncle to the precocious children – obsessed with getting Adam and Tyra, the hero and the heroine, together. Nothing is more important than scheming to get them into each others' "bed furs," as Hill puts it. Not only is this annoying, but the matchmaking shenanigans is set against the backdrop of Danish outlaws pillaging village outposts.
"Unless my father awakens soon and begins to show his face in public, this will be the first of many such strikes, and not just by Ejnar, either," Tyra told Rafn. "Every malcontent from here to Birka will be on the move, sniffing out any weakness in our flanks."
The Danes can smell weakness like a shark. Which is all well and good. But no one seems to care much. The matchmaking continues at Stoneheim. The sisters gossip exclusively about Tyra and Adam; nary a word about their dying father or worries about his comatose state crosses their lips. There are patrols, but only after the attack, which seems silly since they all know of the perceived weakness and should have been working hard to counter it.
They'd burned some timber longhouses, stolen cattle and sheep, taken a few women and children who were unable to run to the mountains, and killed a half dozen fighting men.
This is serious business. If one worries not about the lives that were lost, the captives that have been taken, then surely one must worry about the valuable cattle that were stolen. But the inhabitants of Stoneheim are above such petty cares.
"But we caught this raid early on. Now that we are forewarned, we will send reinforcements to man all of our vulnerable border lines."
Lies. Rafn says "we caught this raid early on" as though that piece of intelligence made any difference to the dead fighting men, the captured women and children and the stolen cattle. It didn't. The Danes had come and gone by the time they arrived. Incidentally, just before she departed Tyra ended up in a long and protracted discussion with Adam about Alrek's annual pay, their relationship and him wanting her to not go. It is utterly irresponsible that she delay going
...she turned and walked stiffly toward the groups of men and horses waiting for her.
It is made clear that her men were ready and waiting for her, but she feels that talking to Adam is more important than the possibility of a burning village. Again, she does not reprimand herself for delaying setting off. Though arguably, it's only ten, twenty minutes, it may be enough to see away the Danes, to engage them in combat – vengeance is better than nothing, after all.
The king was especially engrossed by the events surrounding Tyra and Adam, but he was also more than interested in the outlaws who'd attacked his holdings the night before.
It really reads as though he finds Tyra and Adam more interesting than the outlaw attacking his holdings. Despite having been informed that attacks have been made, and presumably, being the wily old king he is, Thorvald would know that a show of strength in his recovery is essential at this point. He feels no guilt for keeping his recovery a secret from the world because he's too busy perusing some "mush-brained" plot to get Tyra and Adam together. That this very secret is costing him the lives of his people and cattle from his holdings. Though arguably, him making a show of awakening a couple of days earlier might not have made a difference (as the news would not travel as fast) surely he feels the responsibility of his kingdom keenly enough to be ashamed of putting such a petty thing above his people.
Furthermore, he had already trained Tyra to be the warrior that succeeds him. Why does he need her to get married?
After Tyra runs away with her hesirs (further weakening the defences of Stoneheim), Thorvald insists on making the journey to go after her. A rescue and all that. Whilst his kingdom is still under the Danish threat. Whilst it is rather late in the season for an attack, but it seems foolish to underestimate the people who've dealt you a near-fatal blow and successfully raided your village.
The matchmaking plans are not even slightly dented by the attacks or the possibility of more attacks. Especially when the plans seems to involve undermining Tyra's authority as head of the hesirs (see below). It is inane to think making this match is worth undermining the authority of their father's successor in protecting them all. Have they really so much faith that their father would recover and thereby make Tyra's rule redundant? Or do they really have no understanding of how authority works?
All of the secondary characters sound the same after a few chapters as what little personality they have (usually a hobby that borders on obsession) is soon eclipsed by the all-consuming desire to see Adam and Tyra get it on. The stability of the realm, international relations, politics, the safety and wellbeing of others, all rank after.
Inexplicable Wandering Accents
Sandra Hill cannot do accents, so she should have just given up on them. The characters wander Cockney Street Urchin to Somerset Pirate to Yorkshire Farmhand to Modern American. The children, especially, are susceptible to this. The accent won't stay still halfway through a sentence. The uses of the "dost", "nay", "mayhap", "methinks" all sound as though she went through with a find and replace. These pseudo-Shakespearean words are used willy-nilly with less than archaic words like "barmy." The result is a mess and the sentences simply don't scan.
Women! 'Twas hard to figure them out.
The usage of "dost" makes even less bizarre since Hill uses it in the place of "do you", so "Do you think she would consent to wearing pierced bells on her breasts?" becomes:
Dost think she would consent to wearing pierced bells on her breasts?
But "dost" is the second-person singular simple present form of do. It's used with "thou". Dropping the "thou" consistently makes no sense. It's like saying the "do" without the "you."
Also, she uses "methinks" as a cipher for "I think" rather than "it seems to me", which is telling in certain sentences.
Incestuous Overtones
The Chronicler would be the first to admit that we are all too ready to read these into texts, but Adam the Healer's relationship with his sister is rather alarming:
Despite her being covered with filth from bare feet to lice-infested head, as he was, too, Adam thought she was more comely than a harem princess... not that he'd ever seen a harem princess, but he'd heard sailors speak of such.
Arguably, Adam has never seen a harem princess and doesn't know that they are objects of sexual beauty, despite listening in on the talk of sailors who would hardly be reticent about such things. He could have chosen other things of beauty – such as a memorable statue of the Virgin Mary, perhaps, or a folktale princess – which would be less inherently and blatantly sexual. Hill made a conscious decision here to compare the young Adela to a harem princess, in a book which features harems as a prominent fantasy, seems rather alarming.
Small Precocious Children
The Anthropologist and The Chronicler are hardly the sort to go cooing over small children, but they are quite confident that even the most soft-hearted of women would be repulsed by the sheer cutesiness of the children in My Fair Viking. Alrek, aged ten, is at the head of his tiny household, all of whom are younger than him.
Ten is not considered adulthood in Viking terms. Somewhere between fifteen and eighteen is the age most heroes in sagas (both legendary and historical) start out and that seems to be a good age. Puberty should be well underway (though bearing in mind it happens later in ye olde times) and they can handle adult-sized sword and armour. Ten, however, is nowhere near this and Alrek is described in especially tiny and undergrown terms.
As such, Alrek is not only too young to go aviking, he is also too rubbish. He is a walking hazard. No self-respecting captain would let him onto their ship and they would especially not give them special attention the way Tyra does. He isn't trained with a sword and is unable to row. He isn't used as a cabin boy or equivalent, so why he's allowed on is beyond the Chronicler.
"Me father left when I was five. Some say he is a fighting man in the Rus lands; some say he is dead." He shrugged with indifference. "Me mother died last year of the childbed fever. She were a kitchen helper. Two sisters and a brother I have back at Stoneheim. I am the oldest, so I mus' support them with the silver coin King Thorvald pays me each year."
(The Chronicler also wonders how in the world the littlest, Besji, who is two survived her mother getting "childbed fever" since there is no alternative to breastmilk. What was the little tyke drinking all the time its mother was lying dying?)
Furthermore, the idea of Alrek as head of his family is stupid given the communal living arrangements of Stoneheim and Viking society as a whole. They all lived in an enormous longhouse, ate together in the one enormous room and slept in the same enormous room. The idea that he is alone responsible for his siblings is preposterous. This is a society that is knit together with hand-me-downs. Soldiers aren't paid predominately annual fees but live off their lord and are given gold at his will ("ring-giver" and all that) and portions of booty.
If he's being trained to be a Viking warrior, then he should be trained with all the other children at Stonehiem. There are three hundred fighting men at Stoneheim, at least some of whom are married. I could but assume some of them have sprogged and want their offspring to follow in their footsteps. And if I recall correctly, they would be trained by the women when the men are away.
Alrek and his brood already have a family. The women of Stoneheim should be taking care of them along with all the other children. Especially given that they are increasingly incompetent as the story goes on. At first, they are described as clumsy but able to fend for themselves – tough, even – since, they've survived this long. And yet, they're not. At first, Alrek claims Besji is toilet trained and that they used to have to change her linens ever five minutes (incidentally, why are they using linens?!) but later they are shown unable to cope with Besji soiling herself and are harassing Adam to do it.
The children's shenanigans are supposed to be humorous, but it's annoying. Really annoying. And at times, very disturbing as we hear Alrek talk all sorts about virgins and sex. He peers into the room as Tyra and Adam have sex in an obviously supposed-to-be-funny way, but all it elicits in this audience is horror. The communal living should have made it into a matter-of-fact issue, but he gawks at it all in an annoying way.
Also, "youthling" is a stupid, stupid word. Worse than "youngling" and that's saying a lot.
To be continued...
(The Horror is not over Yet.)
