“And that was the way of it. Things belonging where they didn’t. Like two night skies on a frozen lake. One looking down from above and one looking up from the deep.”
When I chose to read this book I didn’t know it was about Vikings, but it tuned out pretty interesting so I kept reading it, although I didn’t really like it at the beginning, I found it a bit slow and boring. *spoilers start here* Like Eelyn herself, I thought she was too much talk and so little actions —even though she’s a really ferocious, fearless and wise warrior in the battlefield— like when she said she would die before becoming a dýr or that she would kill all the Riki she could before she escaped from Fela, but she never did neither of these things, because she ended up changing her mind, like me, who’s ended up admiring Eelyn’s figure.
Through the story Eelyn grows up and starts seeing the Riki as what they truly are: real people with real lives —not monsters—, like the Aska back in Hylli. She had demonized the Riki for what she had been told and what she had seen in the battlefield, but living with them, sharing their everyday and seeing them love, take care and suffer for their loved ones made her see that there was no difference between her people and the Riki but the god they served. Which took her closer to the Riki —including Fiske— and made her understand how her brother could end up becoming a Riki.
That particular situation reminded me of the actual wars, where one side dehumanizes the other, so killing them would be justified because they wouldn’t see the enemies as human beings but as monsters to kill before they kill you. All of it for reasons no one even remember or don’t even exist. Which is pitiful and shameful.
That’s the reason why I think that, even if Adrienne Young didn’t pretend it, Sky in the Deep is a fiction story based on the Vikings myths and history as long as a reflection of our actual society, demonstrating that humanity hasn’t changed and never will, at least not if we don’t really fight —and I don’t mean physically— for it to change.
Adrienne Young has created a great story with an excellent writing, which makes the reading light, the plot intense and the characters development truthful.
I’m sure I forget a lot of things and matters worth talking about from this book, but I don’t want this one to be a long review where I talk about each important character —because they’re too many— and their relationship with the main one, I‘ll let you discover it by yourself, so I’m going to end it here.
On a side note, I’m not sure about reading The Girl the Sea Gave Back, because although I’ve enjoyed reading Sky in the Deep, I’m afraid the second book might disappoint me. I’m not sure if I really want to keep up with this story. So please, tell me your thoughts about it if you’ve read them both, thank you.
Genre: historical fiction, young-adult, romance.
