• Mass Market Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: Del Rey
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0345522486
• ISBN-13: 978-0345522481

Synopsis: Thor, the Norse god of thunder, is worse than a blowhard and a bully—he’s ruined countless lives and killed scores of innocents. After centuries, Viking vampire Leif Helgarson is ready to get his vengeance, and he’s asked his friend Atticus O’Sullivan, the last of the Druids, to help take down this Norse nightmare.

One survival strategy has worked for Atticus for more than two thousand years: stay away from the guy with the lightning bolts. Plus things are heating up in his home base of Tempe, Arizona. There’s a vampire turf war brewing, and Russian demon hunters who call themselves the Hammers of God are running rampant. Despite multiple warnings and portents of dire consequences, Atticus and Leif journey to the Norse plane of Asgard, where they team up with a werewolf, a sorcerer, and an army of frost giants for an epic showdown against vicious Valkyries, angry Norse gods, and the hammer-wielding Thunder Thug himself.

Kevin Hearne wraps up act one of the Iron Druid Chronicles with Hammered, and he lays it all out on the table. In Hexed Atticus made a lot of promises to his friends and allies for help; some of those promises had the potential to bite him in his Irish ass and I had to admit, I was beginning to wonder where Hearne was going to take his story. Up until this point the IDC has been one wild and impossible ride in which our druid hero has kicked a lot of ass without much consequence. That all changes in Hammered; With this book, Hearne kicks up his storytelling, and everything Atticus has done over the course of the last two installments comes to an epic, but bloody head.

This third chapter of The Iron Druid Chronicles surprised me. Hearne has proven himself as a fun, and competent storyteller, but Hammered was a sucker punch to my sensibilities as a reader. For the last two books we’ve been told over and over again that Thor, the Norse god of thunder, was an incredible dick; nobody liked him, but nobody would talk about why. All is revealed as Mr. Hearne channels his inner Chaucer in a classic journeyman’s narrative style; Atticus, Lief, and Gunnar, enlist the aid of  a Russian thunder god, a Finnish wizard, and a Chinese alchemist, all of which have their own grievances against Thor, and each must tell his story so that they can forge a bond that will allow them to invade Asgard. By the end of the last story, our heroes have their blood good and up and they’re ready to go kill themselves a god. Hoorah!

At this point Hearne could have taken Hammered to the same place he took the first two installments: a swashbuckling adventure in which the bad guys get theirs and the good guys saunter off into the sunset, arm in arm. Those books weren’t bad, but I kinda felt like Atticus could shit in God’s loafer and not catch any fallout for it. It was beginning to feel too easy. As it turns out I was being rope-a-doped.  Like in life, there are consequences for your actions, and Atticus now must own up to some of the things he’s done over the past several hundred pages; Hearne is far from kind to him, and in fact, seems to be making up for lost time in dealing out the hurtin’ on our hero. By the end of the book we have a weary and battered Atticus, heavy-hearted with loss, running off in the dead of night with nothing but his dog and his druid initiate sidekick for company. It is an ending that is very reminiscent of The Empire Strikes Back: our heroes have lost a LOT more than they have won, but they lived to fight another day; and fight they will.

The Iron Druid Chronicles started out as a fun, not-too-serious romp and turned into something epic beyond all my expectations. If you like urban fantasy that is fun and funny, then pick up Hounded, Hexed, and Hammered. If you like urban fantasy of great substance then you should pick up Hounded, Hexed, Hammered, and anything else Kevin Hearne puts out in the future. You’ll not be disappointed.

I give Hammered Five out of Five Stars.

Pick up your copy of The Iron Druid Chronicles from Amazon today!

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