Book Review: Loki's Wolves by K.L. Armstrong and M.A. Marr

Loki's Wolves by K.L. Armstrong and M.A. Marr
Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Publication date: May 2013
Pages: 368
Source: ARC from publisher
For: Review
Series: The Blackwell Pages, Book 1

Matt's grown up knowing he's descended from the god Thor - all his family tends to hold his power and pretty much run everything in their small town of Blackwell. But when portents of Ragnarok, the battle at the end of the world, start to show up, he must team up with some unlikely allies. Fen and Laurie are descendents of Loki, the trickster god and sometime enemy of Thor. Can the three of them get along long enough to find the others who will help them in this battle?

Things I Liked:
I enjoyed getting more Norse mythology - I think it's a super rich source of adventures and interesting stories and there aren't enough books out there about it.  It was a fun story, filled with adventures and danger and weird things happening.  I liked the idea that they don't have to follow the old tales exactly as they happen and that they want to change things.  It was a fun start to a new series that will definitely appeal to Rick Riordan fans.

Things I Didn't Like:
I have to admit I kind of just didn't enjoy it.  I'm not sure what precise things might have bothered me, but I just didn't love it.  Near the beginning, I kept thinking the characters were a little bit older, since Matt is into boxing and wrestling and those don't exactly scream 13-year-old sports to me.  They didn't seem like it in a lot of ways.  Maybe that's what initially threw me off and I just couldn't get back into it.  Also, I think it suffers just from being compared to Rick Riordan's books and he does the mythology aspects so well.  Still, I think kids will like it, and be clamoring for sequels.

Read-alikes:
Percy Jackson series by Rick Riordan
Kane Chronicles series by Rick Riordan
Sea of Trolls series by Nancy Farmer (for wonderful Norse mythology)

BOOK CONTENT RATINGS:
s-factor: none

mrg-factor: none

v-factor: ->
a little bit of fighting

Overall rating: ***

What's your favorite mythological book?

If you buy through my Amazon linkage, I will get a very small percentage