The Ship of the Dead by Rick Riordan

(spoilers for The Sword of Summer and The Hammer of Thor)

Goodreads synopsis: Magnus Chase, a once-homeless teen, is a resident of the Hotel Valhalla and one of Odin's chosen warriors. As the son of Frey, the god of summer, fertility, and health, Magnus isn't naturally inclined to fighting. But he has strong and steadfast friends, including Hearthstone the elf, Blitzen the dwarf, and Samirah the Valkyrie, and together they have achieved brave deeds, such as defeating Fenris Wolf and battling giants for Thor's hammer, Mjolnir. Now Magnus faces his most dangerous trial yet. His cousin, Annabeth, recruits her boyfriend, Percy Jackson, to give Magnus some pointers, but will his training be enough?

Loki is free from his chains. He's readying Naglfar, the Ship of the Dead, complete with a host of giants and zombies, to sail against the Asgardian gods and begin the final battle of Ragnarok. It's up to Magnus and his friends to stop him, but to do so they will have to sail across the oceans of Midgard, Jotunheim, and Niflheim in a desperate race to reach Naglfar before it's ready to sail. Along the way, they will face angry sea gods, hostile giants, and an evil fire-breathing dragon. But Magnus's biggest challenge will be facing his own inner demons. Does he have what it takes to outwit the wily trickster god?

My rating: 3 stars.

Content warnings: PG. Lots of fighting, mostly bloodless though body parts go flying. A dragon's blood threatens to melt a character. Constant threat of death. Two characters kiss. A character is gender fluid and will swap from one to the other, and can also shapeshift into animals. The book is entirely centered around Norse mythology with characters being children of said gods. Several main characters are technically dead.

Thoughts: It's a fun series, but I wouldn't say there's any substance to it. Then again, I don't exactly think most of Riordan's work is super deep, it's just fun to explore mythology.

This series interested me mostly just because it was Norse mythology. I was already pretty familiar with Greek and Roman, and even had a working understanding of Egyptian mythology going into the other Riordan books, but what I knew about Norse mythology mainly came from Marvel, which is not a great way to get information. So I was fascinated going into these books.

I think knowing a little more about the mythology going into the books helped me with enjoyment. Either that or Riordan's Norse mythics are pretty indistinguishable from Greek or Roman mythics. Maybe both.

But that's the series in general. This book specifically was just okay. What you'd expect out of a Riordan book, but not much more. The whole Alex thing, though I personally didn't have much use for it, didn't seem to be as bad in the whole "yay, diversity points!" way as it was in other books (looking at you, The Toll), and Sam's religion was a little less offputting than it was in the previous book. It still makes absolutely no sense to me, and I felt like I was being talked down to in the whole Ramadan explanation (though that was probably just because I already knew about it) so that's just me. It seemed respectful in the very least, although I'm not sure how exactly someone who is Islamic might feel about the depiction of their religion in the world of Norse gods. But that's not my area.

The ending isn't any big surprise in any area. Even the second to last scene between Magnus and Alex I actually saw coming, in big picture and a more detailed way. It's a quick read and a fun ride, and I'll leave it at that.