Book Review: Wotan’s Bloody Spear

I recently completed Wotan’s Bloody Spear by Euan Harvey.

Wow.

If you want blood, gore and werewolves galore in your entertainment – read this book.

Caveat: I’m not a werewolf fan. I mean, I’ve watched and read my fair share of werewolf stories, but I don’t go out of my way to find stories that have werewolves in ’em. So, I’m not entirely up on the lore of these critters, but that’s not necessary to enjoy this book, so let’s move on.

Wotan’s Blood Spear is about Stefan von Stawy, a young noblemen that has been afflicted with the wolf-strap – he’s a werewolf. He is taken from his home and is eventually turned into a werewolf knight that works for the empire under the Knight’s of the Bloody Spear order.

Set in mid 15th century Europe, the book actually starts out with Stefan plunked into downtown Constantinople with the task of retrieving a relic before the city is lost to an infamous sultan. But as he does so, he also uncovers a mystery and the start of a corruption running through the empire that goes deep. During the course of the book, we follow Stefan through hell and back, only to realize the key to it all lay near to his heart.

I have to say, I very much enjoyed this book and gave it four out of five stars both on Goodreads (under my pen name) and Amazon.com (under my real name). It had history, intrigue, some epic chases, fights and downright bloody gore.

Did I mention it was bloody? Note the title. This is not for the squeamish. If you can’t handle spinal cords being ripped whole from bodies and demons getting pulverized into fleshy pulp, I suggest you look elsewhere for your werewolf stories. But if you don’t a bit of carnage, Wotan’s Bloody Spear will not disappoint.

I do have some gripes.

I thought the back story of how Stefan becomes a werewolf knight could have come at the beginning, and the story told in chronological order, rather than his coming-of-age story woven in fits and starts. I was so engrossed in the witchstone conspiracy, that it annoyed me to no end that the author then switched to his past. The story of how he came to control the beast within him was also good, that I then got peeved when the story switched back over to the conspiracy.

Also, there were a few typos in the story. None of which were major, but enough to notice. I would suggest another digital edition to weed them out.

But, overall, those two points are minor. The story is grand and the execution excellent. So good, in fact, that I want to see this in movie form. The visuals for some of the fights were that good.

Recommended.