Review of "Animal Attrition" by David Bush

Score: 92+/100 (9.2+ out of 10)

Multi-time OCA winner David Bush continues to introduce the wonders of history (particularly western history) via his extraordinary animal-filled series!

Animal Attrition is the 7th book in the series that began with General Jack and the Battle of the Five Kingdoms. It takes place during the time of the Vikings, 9th century C.E., and is inspired not only by the history but also the culture of the Vikings in Europe at the time, particularly Norse mythology and their heavy emphasis on war. One of the key points of this book is how the Vikings gradually became Christianized despite originally looking down on the Christians and their beliefs, something which changed as the Christians became more successful in war and the Vikings looked to gain favor from their God.

In AD 878, a brilliant-white deer, Lars, is blamed for a chaotic market accident and the superstitious community turns on him. He’s secretly protected by Freydis, a formidable elkhound matriarch who once abandoned him as a newborn (found after a shipwreck) but later bonded to him like a son. The village’s misfortunes (bad weather, disease, a deadly raid) get pinned on Lars, and the druid Gunnar stokes fear. During a midnight plot to kill Freydis and the deer, Odd (Freydis’s surviving, one-eyed son) pressures for a truce, but Lars overhears the conspiracy and chooses exile to save Freydis.

On the road, Lars is joined by a crippled, one-eyed raven calling himself Odin-One-Eye (a fallen echo of the god), who claims Lars’s true mother was a white deer from across the sea--the shipwrecked doe who died after giving birth. The raven lost his eye and wing tailing that voyage; now he rides Lars’s antlers like a living “leafless tree,” needling him with bleak humor as they head south.

Meanwhile, Freydis’s world contracts: husband Njord and son Lot are killed when their supposed ally Rufus (a wolf) pays Blackbeard (a Tailandian bear) to ambush them. Freydis vows vengeance and hardens into a political force, yet she’s still emotionally tethered to Lars.

When Rufus marches on the settlement, Lars climbs a nearby peak and triggers a rockfall, which becomes a full avalanche that buries most of the invaders and kills Rufus. Odd counterattacks and wins. The townsfolk refuse to credit Lars and claim luck returned only because he left. Freydis recognizes his silhouette at the summit, but by the time she brings others to the site, thaw has erased the evidence. Lars, believing exile is the only way to protect her, stays gone.

From here the book widens into allegory: Norse blood-piety versus a rising “white organisation” ethic (harmony among animals and between animals and humans), which--yeah--is a name that raised some of our eyebrows.

Anyway, rumors swirl that Lars isn’t just lucky, he’s an omen. Some imagine him as Yggdrasill’s living sign (life-making over war-making), and even Freydis, battle-hard, pragmatic, suspends animal sacrifices for a time. The finale refuses a fireworks Ragnarok: instead, characters choose what to be. Odd and Freydis look toward Tailandia (the old homeland) as a literal and symbolic workshop to forge a new society, carrying a small lantern of hope into the dark. It’s a twilight, not of annihilation, but of realignment.

This book, similar to Animal Quest and Animals Divided, really feels rushed.

The best example we have of that is the encounter between Lars and Blackbeard. What seemed like it was heading toward a great, action-packed scene seems to fizzle out before it even began. It builds, then flattens. That whole scene seemed rushed, and everything after that really felt crammed-in. It's strange because the book was building quite well.

Being brief and concise isn't entirely a bad thing. You can read this book in about three hours or so, which is great for YA, middle-grade, and younger readers. It's an opportunity for them to learn some history.

However, similar to other books in the series, it often seems like the historical sections are actually more interesting and fun to read than the fiction. You'll learn a lot from it!

With that said, this book has one shining light: the relationship between Lars and Odin-One-Eye (the raven) is charming and humorous. We're assuming this relationship reflects the tenuous relationship that Vikings and Christians had in their early years. Odin-One-Eye clearly reflects a Viking culture that is hanging on by a thread in the face of a larger, more powerful cultural force. He seems to represent lost or old glory. Viking culture is adapting, bargaining, and losing ground in stages as it struggles to exist and coexist.

This book is very promising and quite valuable as a way to teach history to children. We just wish that the last third didn't seem so rushed. A fantastic historical-fiction series overall!

Check it out on Amazon!