Kata & Tor
Kevin Crossley-Holland
Walker Books

Set in 1066, the focus of this story is a failed invasion of York by the Vikings led by King Harald Hardrada of Norway and leader of the Viking fleet.. The king has sent his youngest son Tor and companion Eirik ahead as information-gathering scouts but an accident wrecks their boat and Eirik ends up dead. Unsure where he’s landed up and without a partner, Tor is at a loss to know what to do. He realises he must bury his friend but before so doing he goes wandering along the beach, discovers a hut and spends a couple of nights there before proceeding with his mission, telling those who ask that he’s come from Orkney in order to avoid suspicion.

Meanwhile Kata who knows very little about her parents, is hard at work in her village supporting herself and neighbours, yearning for something other than marriage at a young age within her Anglo-Saxon village and environs.

It’s fate that brings the two young people together and they’re immediately attracted to one another. However in such troubled times being in love with someone from so different a background and with rumours spreading about the imminent coming of Hardrada, Kata is constantly asking herself if she’s fallen for a Viking and if so, then what? Tor too has a difficult dilemma: he insists to Kata that he’s not a Viking – he certainly doesn’t want to fight – and is at odds with himself – but he has to decide where he really belongs. Can they find a way to be together?

History lovers in particular will enjoy this tale much of which, though not the titular characters, is historically accurate.