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The Sea of Trolls

(Sea of Trolls #1)

Nancy Farmer (Goodreads Author)

really liked it 4.00 · Rating details · 14,377 ratings · 1,041 reviews

The year is A.D. 793; Jack and his sister have been kidnapped by Vikings and taken to the court of Ivar the Boneless and his terrifying half-troll wife; but things get even worse when Jack finds himself on a dangerous quest to find the magical Mimir's Well in a far-off land, with his sister's life forfeit if he fails.

Other threats include a willful mother Dragon, a giant ...more

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Paperback, 459 pages

Published June 1st 2006 by Atheneum Books for Young Readers (first published January 28th 2004)

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Apr 12, 2012 Michael Fierce rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Recommends it for: Hobbit fans, fans of Nordic Scandinavian fantasy

Shelves: favorite-books, dragons, trolls, spider, vikings, hobbit-influenced, norse-mythology

After Jack becomes apprenticed to a Druid bard, he and his little sister Lucy are captured by Viking Berserkers and taken to the home of King Ivar the Boneless and his half-troll queen, leading Jack to undertake a vital quest to Jotunheim, home of the trolls.

This book has everything I enjoy in a story. Charm, wit, cool scary creatures, and likeable characters you can connect with.

It's a children's book. A children's book that is also for adults.

It has a background and history that ties

Unlike most sagas, it's a fun, mostly lighthearted, upbeat adventure, feeling more like The Hobbit than anything else.

A further description from Nancy Farmer's website:

Jack, a Saxon boy, and his sister, Lucy, are kidnapped by Vikings. When Lucy offends the Viking Queen, who is a half-Troll, the Queen's hair falls out. She threatens to sacrifice Lucy unless Jack can restore the hair. With Thorgil, a Viking maiden, Jack goes on a quest to fetch water from Mimir's well that will re-grow the Queen's hair. Jack and Thorgil have to face their own deepest fears and battle with a troll bear and a dragon, escape giant spiders, and stay on the right side of the fearsome Trolls who live near the well.

The Sea of Trolls weaves a cohesive storyline through a strong beginning, middle, and end.

Nancy Farmer is a gifted, award-winning author - The Sea of Trolls having won and been nominated for several awards itself.

This makes for a great introduction to Nordic and Scandinavian myths and the Vikings of old for both young and old readers. If you have already gotten your feet wet in other Norse sagas, I think you would find many things to like in this book. As mentioned before, if you enjoyed The Hobbit and are looking for a fun adventure similar in world mythology and tone, even so much so as having a similar Monster Manual line-up, this book is for you.

I think it's a wonderful achievement and look forward to reading the rest of the trilogy, The Land of the Silver Apples, and The Islands of the Blessed.

* As you can see from my full review, all the book covers to The Sea of Trolls are striking and very fitting to the story. Maybe, someday, I'll be able to own them all and add them to my collection.

Recommended!

...more

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Mar 12, 2009 Kim rated it liked it

Shelves: 11-and-up, fantasy

Really I would give this book 3 1/2 stars. I liked it.

In my daughter's review, she said this book was "gruesome" so I felt compelled to read it to find out what that meant to her. I would not use that same word to describe it. It is a story set in Viking times, and a historical event was used as background to this story - when Lindisfarne, AKA the Holy Isle was destroyed by Vikings in 793 AD. Although this is a story about Vikings, that is only one aspect of it. And for this story to be ...more

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Mar 23, 2011 Emily Michelle rated it really liked it

I thought I would adore this series. I love historical fiction; I love middle grade/YA books; I love Norse mythology; I love books about the British Isles and about folklore, so I doubly love books about British folklore. And this series had it all. I thought that this one would be one of those series that I would check out from the library and love so much that I'd run to the bookstore and buy my own copies. And then I read the trilogy and it was . . . nice. It was fun. But it wasn't great.

Each I thought I would adore this series. I love historical fiction; I love middle grade/YA books; I love Norse mythology; I love books about the British Isles and about folklore, so I doubly love books about British folklore. And this series had it all. I thought that this one would be one of those series that I would check out from the library and love so much that I'd run to the bookstore and buy my own copies. And then I read the trilogy and it was . . . nice. It was fun. But it wasn't great.

Each book in the series has a unique set of strengths and weaknesses. In this first book, the plot was a bit rambling; the actual conflict, the part that you would focus on if you were explaining to someone what the book was about, isn't even mentioned until halfway through the book. Rambling epic journeys work, but only when we always know the end goal. The writing style was a bit uneven; generally it was what you'd expect for an 8th century epic journey, but occasionally a very modern-sounding line or word would pop up and sound thoroughly anachronistic--for example, the characters all use what are supposed to sound like period curses ("By Thor's hammer!") but at one point a character's curse is edited out with a string of #!@& like in an old cartoon. It's an attempt at a joke but it feels out of place. The use of the nursery rhyme "Jack and Jill," though Farmer does have a historical basis for its conclusion, is thoroughly jarring.

The characterization in Sea of Trolls is hit-and-miss as well. Jack is fairly likable; he feels realistic and you believe in his motivations, even if he spends a great deal of time waiting for things to happen to him. The Bard would be the coolest teacher ever. Many of the less-important Vikings are entertaining, and the Viking named Rune is quite sympathetic and interesting. But secondary protagonist Thorgil is so ill-tempered for so long, with absolutely no signs of humanity, that when the author wants you to start feeling bad for her, it's hard to actually dredge up any sympathy. And her turn to friendliness is quite sudden and unfounded. I found certain other characters, such as Jack's father and sister, almost unbearably irritating.

And the Vikings in general posed a problem for the author. Jack spends most of the book in their company, and he has exciting adventures and becomes a better bard for it, so you become attached to those characters and their world. The fact remains, though, that they're murderers and thieves and slave traders, and the reader, like Jack, can't really decide whether or not we're supposed to like them. And maybe that was Farmer's point--that the lines between good and evil are blurred in real life, and that in a world as harsh as the Northmen's, where pillaging is the only way to survive, someone can be kind and funny and a devoted family man but also a cold-blooded killer--but it never feels like that's what she's trying to get at. It just feels muddled, like Farmer could never make up her mind about Vikings either.

For all that, though, there are a great number of excellent aspects of this book. Most of these have to do with the huge amount of research Farmer must have done. The best historical fiction books, in my opinion, pack in period detail but do it so deftly that by the time you're done, you're well informed on the time period but you don't feel like you sat through a history lesson. Sea of Trolls excels at this. Saxon England and Viking Norway are both recreated with astonishing detail that manages to avoid bogging down the story. History classes teach you the dates and the events, but the book takes you into people's homes, into the everyday lives of farmers and sailors and Vikings and kings. No less detailed is the description of the culture and the mythology. The book falters slightly where Farmer tries to reconcile all different religions and create a world where all belief systems are equally true, because it just doesn't work that well in her narrative, but other than that the mythology is fascinating. The beliefs of early Christians and Irish bards and Vikings are all described in detail, with bits of myths and legends woven in (Beowulf, especially, plays a huge part in the story). The focus, at least in this first book, is on Norse beliefs, and it's an excellent primer on Norse gods and the deeply Viking belief in fate and in the importance of achieving fame and dying heroically. That amount of historic and folkloric detail pushes this book up to four stars for me. ...more

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Jan 28, 2012 Amy Neftzger rated it it was amazing

Jack is a young bard in training when he is kidnapped along with his sister and taken by a group of Beserkers and brought to their icy northern land. The book chronicles Jack's capture and adventures as he embarks upon a quest to win back his freedom and save his sister from the temperamental half troll queen Frith. The book creatively adapts Norse mythology into a engaging adventure story that demonstrates the clash of two cultures and how the children learn to work things out to accomplish ...more

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Oct 23, 2009 Mark Adderley rated it really liked it

Shelves: fantasy

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. This is a fast-moving and intelligent novel for children. Jack and his sister Lucy get kidnapped by Vikings during the historic raid on Lindisfarne in 793. Arriving in Norway, Jack finds that he has to undertake a quest to find Mimir's Well in order to save his sister from the half-troll queen, Frith.

One negative aspect of this novel is the rather spare style, which doesn't enable you to really get into the story well. Things happen blindingly fast. It isn't difficult to follow--I just like to This is a fast-moving and intelligent novel for children. Jack and his sister Lucy get kidnapped by Vikings during the historic raid on Lindisfarne in 793. Arriving in Norway, Jack finds that he has to undertake a quest to find Mimir's Well in order to save his sister from the half-troll queen, Frith.

One negative aspect of this novel is the rather spare style, which doesn't enable you to really get into the story well. Things happen blindingly fast. It isn't difficult to follow--I just like to absorb myself a little more thoroughly, that's all. And Farmer keeps dropping modernisms into her prose: "Just say no to pillaging," for example. This one's very witty, of course, but they mount up, and are a bit distracting.

But there are many more positive aspects. There's a lot of very accurate Scandinavian mythology in the book--the tales of Odin, Loki, Mimir's Well, etc., are all accurately portrayed. And that's hardly surprising, since the bibliography Farmer provides at the end is enough for a graduate course!

Also, the characters are very appealing. Jack is a likable hero. (I'm not sure that Jack is a historically-accurate name, but that's nitpicking.) Thorgil, the boy who turns out to be a girl berserker, is also strangely appealing. But towering over them both is Olaf One-Brow, the Viking leader who remains a powerful presence and extremely likable, even while he's uncompromisingly violent in nature.

And that's yet another strength of the book. There's no simple answer to the problems Farmer sets up. The characters at the end don't just agree to stop fighting one another. The Jotuns (trolls) become very appealing in the middle section of the book, but they don't agree to stop eating people when Jack leaves their kingdoms. And it's very clear at the end of the book that the Vikings are going to continue raiding England, as they did historically for another two hundred years. Olaf One-Brow retains his violent tendencies, even in his most attractive moments.

A rich and complex book, very entertaining, and well worth spending the time on. ...more

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Oct 26, 2011 Hazel Lee rated it really liked it

Recommended to Hazel by: Chase.curriculum

Shelves: fiction-juvenile, fiction-fantasy, chase

I loved reading this book - epic adventure, full of all the traditional elements of a good fantasy: trolls, dragons, warriors, bards, and magic. But the adventure is made better by the complexity of the characters. There are no clear-cut lines between good and evil in this book - only characters that are very human in their imperfection. I think this book does a good job of pushing young readers to think about cultural relativism - or at least introduce them to the concept.

I was annoyed by the ...more

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Nov 07, 2011 B.C. rated it liked it

I purchased this book a while ago for two reasons: the cover and the setting. If that were the only reasons for buying this book, then you will be a happy camper. If you believe the story should whisk you away like the cover and setting should, then you will be kind ofmeh, as I was.

Lets break it down shall we?

WINS

Setting - The world was beautiful. It was full of life and color and smells. I truly enjoyed being in the world that was set up. I feel like the author did the Norse mythology justice ...more

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Jan 03, 2016 Chris rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

I admit it, I gushed throughout nearly this entire book. I listened to it, and the narration was superb, and I think that played a large part in my enthusiasm for it. Nonetheless, I do think the writing is high quality. Simple, direct, concise, and spellbinding.

Jack and his sister, Lucy, are forced on an adventure with lovable, loathsome wild men from the North. They romp and role with a girl who wins belching contests and wants to die fighting as soon as possible. They cower before half-trolls ...more

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Nov 18, 2018 Chris Gager rated it liked it · review of another edition

Time for even more escapist fiction. For this we're back in the early Dark Age. Middle Earth, Beowulf, Berserkers etc. Will get more into it tonight.

So far, so good, but the adventurin' hasn't really started yet. The oh-so-typical mentor/teacher/wizard - student thing is happening, of course, and reminds one of The Wizard of Earthsea, and many others.

Moving along now in this entertaining book. Jack's quest will end soon and the book with it. The book SERIES, however will go onward. Whether or ...more

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May 19, 2009 Mike rated it really liked it

Shelves: fiction, childrens-books, mythology

The basis for the Celtic mythological worldview is that there is a separate world from ours, parallel and magical, that can be reached through certain states of mind, interactions with magical creatures, or portals. And the basic hero myth of all cultures starts with a mundane reality (almost always with a farm boy), a journey to a strange new land, magical talismans, and the return home.

This book takes the hero myth and the parallel world myth, blends it together with a veneer of historical ...more

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Mar 24, 2012 Kate Hale rated it it was amazing

I don't think I would have ever picked this book up - simply because of its title. I know that's a little shallow, but to me trolls spell BIG, UGLY, and HAIRY. Ugh. Although they are all of these things in Farmer's Sea of Trolls, the story beautifully weaves Nordic mythology with fictionalized history in this tale of adventure. It takes place in Anglo-Saxon Europe, where the Vikings (known in the book only as really large Northmen with a thirst for booty and plunder topped with wild red hair) ...more

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Jun 07, 2017 Ai Miller rated it really liked it

Shelves: summer-recs-2017, fantasy, historical-fiction, women-authors, disabled-authors, ya, fiction

This book was super super fun! The writing managed to make it really believable that we were seeing the world through a child's eyes (well, an 11-year-old) and it was still really an intriguing, wonderful book. It also felt very self-contained, though I am intending to go off and read the other two. It was clear that Nancy Farmer did a lot of research, but not in an info-dump way that makes it clear that's what she was doing. The book was exciting and an easy read--I finished it in about two ...more

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May 26, 2015 Yami rated it really liked it · review of another edition

I remember finding this one in a pile of old books in the used-book market, I held in my hand thought about it, left it behind me, returned back and got it , that was nearly 2-3 years ago,,,

and only now I got the chance to read it, to be honest the cover art was not encouraging me enough, the novel looked old , but there is time for every thing, and so i started it.

In the beginning the pages and the story felt uncertain, the way the story been told was weird ,I didn't know how the rest of the I remember finding this one in a pile of old books in the used-book market, I held in my hand thought about it, left it behind me, returned back and got it , that was nearly 2-3 years ago,,,

and only now I got the chance to read it, to be honest the cover art was not encouraging me enough, the novel looked old , but there is time for every thing, and so i started it.

In the beginning the pages and the story felt uncertain, the way the story been told was weird ,I didn't know how the rest of the pages will folded, the boy Jack met the bard who decided to make him an apprentice, and that was that, Jack was learning wizardry in some sort of way...but then what?
the answer was "Vikings",they came and the story changed 180 degrees, it turned up side down to become this trilling adventure, and everything was totally different than what i would have expected, the chr. and the magic was refreshing, and highly enjoyable.

I am glad that this novel found its way to fall into my hands, cos it would be a shame to miss such an amazing adventure.

Plot Summery
(view spoiler)
...more

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Nov 20, 2010 Pam ☼Because Someone Must Be a Thorn☼ Tee rated it liked it

Hmmm. This is one of those books where you should ignore the star ratings and find a reviewer with similar tastes to try and determine if you should give it a try. Which is to say that while I only gave "Sea of Trolls" 3-Stars that I can see why other people, especially younger readers, would love it. The story is interesting and there's lots of adventure. Plus the writing is decent... so what's not love, right?

Well, I found a couple of things that detracted from the reading experience. The ...more

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Jul 09, 2010 Karen A. rated it really liked it

Shelves: junior-fiction

I love Nancy Farmer's guts. She tackles new genres like she has nothing to loose and always comes up with excellent work. The Sea of Trolls has a great young protagonist in Jack who is loaned to the local Bard by his poor farmer father. From the Bard he begins to learn magic but just barely and not enough to save his village from being pillaged by the Vikings. He and his sister are taken captive. Beginning an exciting and perilous journey back to the land of the Vikings. Lots of Nordic mythology ...more

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Jan 15, 2014 Kaethe Douglas rated it it was amazing

Shelves: animals, fiction, kids, ya, adventure, cats, feminism, history, middle-grade, magic

I'm enjoying this quite a bit, during my doctor's office waits. I recommended it to the Possum, too.

***

The conjunctivitis sure slowed my reading down. Oh, but this was fun. All the pleasure of Norse mythology, but zippier than Tolkein. Great characters, particularly the way Jack never feels like he'll get the Norsemen.

As a special added bonus, I understand Odd and the Frost Giants rather better now, too.

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Dec 20, 2016 Vera rated it it was amazing

Shelves: fiction, young-adult, mythology

It took me a year to finish it because I started reading it to my daughter first and then we kind of got stuck and I put it aside.
But the book is great, amazing characters and mythology and history woven together.

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Nov 15, 2011 Rburenstein rated it it was amazing

The Sea of Trolls by Nancy Farmer is an intense, interesting, suspenseful fantasy book based around an 11-year-old boy named Jack, and his little sister Lucy. The book takes place in 793 A.D. of a fantasy world. This world is separated into 3 regions, each containing different occupants. One is an icy region containing the Ice trolls called Jotunheim, one containing the berserkers, and one containing humans. Jack and Lucy are kids in a family of four, living on a seaside town. Jack spends a lot The Sea of Trolls by Nancy Farmer is an intense, interesting, suspenseful fantasy book based around an 11-year-old boy named Jack, and his little sister Lucy. The book takes place in 793 A.D. of a fantasy world. This world is separated into 3 regions, each containing different occupants. One is an icy region containing the Ice trolls called Jotunheim, one containing the berserkers, and one containing humans. Jack and Lucy are kids in a family of four, living on a seaside town. Jack spends a lot of his time with the Bard, who is the only one on the island who knows how to read, and tells wonderful stories. The villagers of the island are all somewhat scared of the Bard because they think that he is magical because he can read, and is a very strange man.
The Beginning of the book centers on Jack and the Bard building a relationship, and eventually the Bard becoming Jacks mentor. The Bard tells Jack myths and stories, like Beowulf, Mimir’s Well, and the Bard’s argument with Frothi a troll queen. The Bard eventually reveals to Jack that he is indeed magic, and can bend some of the laws of the world. After one day the Bard warns jack that berserkers are coming to raid the village, and to warn the other villagers. The next day Jack visits the Bard, but the Bard is crazy and cannot seem to communicate, he just squawks whenever he opens his mouth. Later that day the berserkers raid the village, and kidnap Jack and Lucy.
Jack wakes up on a boat with a berserker crew, the captain is named Olaf. On the boat a tom girl girl berserker named Thorgil bullies Jack, but find entices the crew with his poems and singing. While spending one of his days on the boat a crow flies down and sits next to Jack, this crow spends the rest of the journey with Jack. Olaf and his crew attempt to sell Jack and Lucy at a slave market, but no one purchases Jack and Lucy at a slave market, but no one purchases either of them, so Olaf takes them back to his house. Jack and Lucy stay at Olaf’s house until there is a large feast with the Troll royalty. During the feast Jack tries to sing a song about Friths (a troll princess) hair, because it is immaculate. During the song Jack accidentally uses magic, and Friths hair falls out completely. As a result of this, Frith decides to take Lucy, and go back to Jotunheim until Jack can make her hair grow back.
Jack asks Olaf to take him to Jotunheim in order to save Lucy, and Olaf agrees but demands that he and Thorgil are travelling with him. The three (and the crow) arrive in Jotenheim. During their first night in Jotenheim Olaf fights a gigantic boar, and gets mortally wounded, but in a gallant finishing breath he kills the boar. Jack and Thorgil bury Olaf, and then continue on their adventure after mourning Olafs death. On their adventure Jack and Thorgil defeat a dragon, the dragons blood gets on Thorgil and gives her the power to converse with animals. Jack and Thorgil arrive at the Ice troll palace, and talk to the troll queen, they get along very well and she invites them to watch her play a chess game with The Fates. Before watching the queen and The Fates play chess Jack tries to use his to restore Friths hair, but he cannot perform the magic necessary to give her hair back. Jack and Thorgil then go to the chess game, and during the game The Fates teleport them to Mimir’s Well. Mimir’s well has the ability to grant any wish, as long as something is given up in return. Jack gives up a special necklace that the Bard gave him, and Thorgil gives up her tom girl attitude, by doing this she is able to get rid of the effect of the dragon’s blood, and Jack is able to perform the magic that is necessary. On returning Jack restores Frith’s hair, and is returned to the berserkers, who then bring Jack and Lucy back to their hometown. Upon coming home their parents are overjoyed, and bring them to see the crazy Bard. The bard continues to speak gibberish, and has to be taken care of by the citizens. After being home for a day the Bard is back to normal, and reveals that he was the crow travelling with Jack all along, and that he told Thorgil but she decided to not tell Jack that the crow was the Bard all along.
This was a truly amazing book, and I don’t think that a book report is able to do it justice. The suspense of what is going to happen is very dramatic throughout the story, and a lot of things can happen in this fantasy world. When reading this I had no idea that the crow was the Bard all along, and it was a very big surprise to me at the end of the book. There are a lot more amazing, smaller part of the plot that I am not able to talk about in this book report because it will be too long, but they were all very interesting and nicely wrapped up at the end of the book.
...more

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Dec 20, 2018 Nicolas Brown rated it really liked it

I loved this book! It was fantastic, and the narrator of the audiobook was amazing as well! It made me laugh out loud, and it caused me to sit a few extra minutes through intense scenes. It didn't make me cry, but not all books need to make you cry. I'm excited to read the next book.

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Aug 15, 2011 Doriana rated it really liked it

Recommends it for: older children/ YA

Recommended to Doriana by: Middle school Librarian

I read the Sea of Trolls for the first time in grade six, soo probably 2005/2006. I came across it by way of my school librarian to whom I had been complaining that I had been having trouble finding YA novels that appealed to me after falling in love with adult writers (my teachers very much disapproved of my choice of novels for silent reading, what they had against people like Brenda joyce and Dean Kootnz is beyond me, I guess they never read good horror or historical romance.) My librarian I read the Sea of Trolls for the first time in grade six, soo probably 2005/2006. I came across it by way of my school librarian to whom I had been complaining that I had been having trouble finding YA novels that appealed to me after falling in love with adult writers (my teachers very much disapproved of my choice of novels for silent reading, what they had against people like Brenda joyce and Dean Kootnz is beyond me, I guess they never read good horror or historical romance.) My librarian gave this to me because he knew that I was interested in history but hadn't really read anything at the time about the Viking era.
I loved this book because I learned a lot reading it, which I always think is the best way to learn, by way of a good story. I haven't read it in a few years but I will always remember that it got me interested in different religions. At the time my family was slowly changing from Christian to Wicca. I loved the fact that Wicca was very earthy and ancient and I really developed an interest in religion, at the time mostly other sort of forgotten/not very popular nowadays religions such as roman/greek/egyptian, but had never really known much about Viking beliefs.
Anyways religion isn't the main focus of the book, though it does play a good sized role. I thought that Nancy Farmer did an excellent job making the story come to life, I felt like the characters were captivating and I definitely recall staying up all night because I couldn't find a place to stop for want to finish out the story. I thought that this book was a good length, it was long enough to finish what needed to be finished but still leave you looking forward to another book in the series. It was chunky enough in size for me( I had a thing for big books back then, like reading small books was a bad thing) and ever since reading it I have referred it to friends.
However I have to point out that I LOVED this book as a 12 yr old. I wouldn't say that I love it quite so much now, though it still sits on my favourites bookshelf at home mostly for sentimentality, but also because I genuinely think it's a very good book. If ever I have children I think this will be something that I will be happy to pluck off the shelf and let them read/read with them when they are around the age I first read it, depending on what sorts of things they enjoy reading. (I was reading V.C Andrews with my mother around that time, not to mention I was obsessed with horror, so I can't say that I thought it was especially violent, I thought it was true to the time set of the story but for someone not used to reading about violence it could be a bit frightening.)
All in all I would give it a read, the whole series in fact though I don't remember reading the other books, I am sure that they are good just like this one. ...more

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Nov 30, 2010 Readingtween rated it it was amazing

An amazing book, Nancy Farmer writes very well. This book is a clean read and will completely just suck you in. It is the first of three books about a boy named Jack. Jack starts out as a regular old farmer's brat but the Bard, an old man living in an old Roman house up the road from the village, starts training Jack to be a Bard too. So Jack learns all sorts of magic and fun things that his father thinks are all very unholy. See, Jack's father, Giles Crookleg, wanted badly to be a monk and do ...more

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Jan 06, 2010 Trickey rated it it was amazing

Shelves: non-adult-fiction

Nancy Farmer comes through again! A winner of a number of awards including multiple Newbery Medals, her stories have captivated me ever since I read The Ear, the Eye, and the Arm in middle school, which I'd picked from a list of Newbery winners.

The Sea of Trolls is in a completely different style than the other two books I've read by Farmer, and this is something I really like about her. When you pick of a book of hers, you know it's not going to be same story, different characters or even the ...more

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Oct 13, 2011 melissa1lbr rated it it was amazing

Shelves: collection, favorites, young-adult, audio, middle-grade

Things I Liked:
What a fun story! I wish I'd read this one sooner. The mythology is absolutely fabulous. I adored learning more about Norse and Scandinavian mythos, particularly the gods and the trolls. The story is interesting and unique and it evoked the great quests so common in high fantasy. But what I really loved was the historical element as well. This is set in the dark ages of England and Scandinavia and that setting is written so thoroughly that you can't help but fall into it! The ...more

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Jan 03, 2011 Laina rated it it was amazing

May I just say that I ♥ Nancy Farmer? She is possibly my very favorite author. I love the pictures she paints with such simple, exquisite strokes. I love her characters who seem so innocent and unsure, yet they are immensely brave. I love the friends she creates, and the feeling of reality that soaks through her stories, even if they are about trolls and vikings and giant owls. This book especially was just a joy. I absolutely loved Jack, the young bard apprentice who has to find himself on an ...more

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Jun 20, 2009 Elizabeth McDonald rated it really liked it

Recommends it for: fantasy lovers

Recommended to Elizabeth by: Zach

Shelves: childrens, audiobook, fantasy, historical-fiction

I picked this up on audiobook after reading Zach's review, and I must say that I enjoyed it as much as I think I would have if I had found it when I was ten - which is to say, very much. It's on my imaginary list of "books that would be good to read aloud to my hypothetical offspring".

I am enchanted by Nancy Farmer's settings. Having previously tackled Zimbabwe in 2194, she now tries her hand at Saxon England and Scandinavia ca. 793. She mixes genuine history, authentic historical fiction, ...more

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Nov 03, 2008 Natalie rated it really liked it

Shelves: historical-fiction, young-readers-for-all-ages, adventure-fiction, ya

Although a long read, this a great book to read aloud because it appeals to people of all ages. Tempting to "buffer" between sessions together though! We all caught one another buffering when we read this book together. ;) Lots of primary school kids have borrowed our copy and it has gone to many read-ins. There is something about Nancy Farmer's style and the way the action keeps on coming and the characters keep on developing that makes this book a page turner. The House of the Scorpion and The ...more

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Nov 08, 2011 Evan Hays rated it really liked it

Shelves: fantasy, fiction

The best children's/young adult book I have read since the Graveyard Book. Highly recommend this one. The author, who actually has a science background, really did her historical research for this one. The backdrop is northeastern England (probably somewhere around what today would be Newcastle) around the year 800 AD. This is Saxon England, England greatly influenced by Celtic Christianity, England that still holds onto many of its pre-Christian ideas and mythology, and England on the verge of ...more

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Nov 23, 2009 Jimmy rated it it was amazing

This gripping book by Nancy Farmer is about a boy who is a little farmer brat that is given the chance of a lifetime and takes advantage of it. Jack is taught to be a bard by Dragon Tongue and is and taken on life threatening adventures.

The bard of their town named Dragon Tongue is an all powerful wizard who takes Jack under his wing and teaches him the ways of a bard. When the Northman King finds out about Dragon Tongues existence he sends a nightmare to take the bards wits. The northmen come ...more

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Mar 02, 2013 Kelley Ceccato rated it liked it

Shelves: far-from-feminist

This is a rollicking adventure, a feast if you like Norse mythology. I have to admit I was thoroughly entertained by this book, even as I spent a good bit of it grinding my teeth. I would recommend this to any young boy who loves fantasy and adventure -- but I would hesitate before suggesting it to any girl who loves same.

The book's main flaw, and it's a big one (for me, anyway), is that its female characters are uniformly repellent. Of all of them, only the very minor characters of Heide and ...more

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Mar 21, 2012 Janessa rated it it was amazing

Shelves: young-adult

I loved this book the first time I read it, years ago, and loved it even more reading it the second time with my fifth grader. The setting is beautifully realized - the primitive northern villages of the Vikings, the early Anglo-Saxon settlements, and the icy mountains of Jotunheim. The cast of characters is diverse, vivid, heroic, humorous, and frightening. Jack's quest to free his younger sister, Lucy, from the Troll Queen after Lucy is captured by Vikings is compelling and completely engaged ...more

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Discuss This Book

topics	posts	views	last activity
Do you think that the story was good how it is or needs more excitement?	3	4	Jan 13, 2016 12:42PM
What's the Name o...: Young Adult book; young boy is captured by vikings? Travel on ships. [s]	4	28	Jan 09, 2015 02:49PM
Nancy Farmer's The Sea of Trolls - fantastic!	5	50	Dec 27, 2013 06:35PM
The Sea of Trolls	11	51	Nov 30, 2011 01:22PM
Endicott Mythic F...: The Sea of Trolls (Sea of Trolls, #1) - Discussion	4	12	Mar 28, 2011 10:23AM

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About Nancy Farmer

Nancy Farmer

1,278 followers

Nancy was born in 1941 in Phoenix and grew up in a hotel on the Arizona-Mexico border where she worked the switchboard at the age of nine. She also found time to hang out in the old state prison and the hobo jungle along the banks of the Colorado River. She attended Reed College in Portland, Oregon, earning her BA in 1963. Instead of taking a regular job, she joined the Peace Corps and was sent to ...more