I generally like the Iron Druid books. Perhaps I should have read this, not listened to the audiobook. I listened first in September 2020, and said then: It's narrated by Christopher Ragland, and while he's a decent narrator, after a while the 'comic' voice he uses for Oberon (who is telepathic) becomes a little wearing. Also, if I'm honest, I'd like to see Atticus in a situation where he's not running from or fighting multiple pantheons of gods all the time - Norse and Greek, mostly, plus complications with the Tuatha de Danann. But, at least, after 12 years of restraint, Atticus gets the girl.

I re-listened to this in January 2024 and found the voice of the narrator grated even more, especially in the slow bits. There's a full 30 minutes which seems like thirty hours where a dwarf is telling a battle tale, and the accent is excruciating.

I really like the Iron Druid books, featuring Atticus, an ancient druid who looks about nineteen and runs a bookstore in Tempe Arizona. He has a quirky Irish Wolfhound called Oberon, with whom he has a telepathic link, and an apprentice Druid called Granuaile.

Anyhow, this time Atticus is in trouble after making a couple of promises in exchange for help in the previous book. Both involve trips to Asgard. The first, to retrieve a golden apple, is bad enough, and leads to unintended fatalities. The second promise, to his vampire lawyer friend, Leif, is a game changer. He's promised that he will help Leif kill the Norse god Thor. Thor, apparently is a dangerous and destructive arse, and could do with a good killing, so Atticus Leif and Gunnar the werewolf end up with a team, a Russian thunder god, a Finnish magician and a Chinese immortal, all with good reasons to want Thor dead. But you can't go up against one Norse god without going up against the whole pantheon. There's a lot of collateral damage to the denizens of Asgard and Atticus is warned twice that killing Thor will have extremely bad repercussions, but unfortunately the team members are determined to finish the job

I confess I didn't enjoy this book as much as the first two, and I was trying to work out why. Less Oberon, maybe? In places the pacing seems a little slow, and I didn't particularly connect with the new characters in the god-killing team, especially when there's a long break while everyone tells their own story. In previous books Atticus has been defending himself against beings who want him dead, maybe that's why it didn't feel quite right that this time he was going after someone (a god, no less) without a personal grudge. He knows it's not right, but he's made a promise to a friend and he's going to keep it. I presume the next book will deal with the fallout from Atticus and company's trip to Asgard.