Book Review: Hammered

Hammered (Iron Druid Chronicles #3)
by Kevin Hearne
Paperback, 310 pages
Published July 5th 2011 by Random House Publishing Group
Source: Bought
Buy the book: Amazon | Book Depository | Barnes & Noble

Summary:

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. But things are heating up in Atticus’s 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 plain 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 gods, and the hammer-wielding Thunder Thug himself.

Review:

Can Atticus and Oberon get anymore awesome? Yes, yes they can. Hammered, the third book in the Iron Druid Chronicles, is a proof to that. Although, there was less exposure for Oberon in this book compared to the first two, the hound still managed to show off his intelligence to the readers. He had proven that he could stand his ground on a debate whether bacon lattes exist or not, and had even managed to come up with his own theory about them. He could also use a 5-syllable-word in a sentence, how about that?

Hammered picks up three weeks after Hexed. The third book in the Iron Druid Chronicles is basically all about keeping one's end of the bargainS. Yes, it's plural. On the first half of the book, the bargain Atticus had to keep was of  Laksha's, an Indian witch who helped him kill the bacchants who had been terrorizing Arizona in book 2. On the second half was of the vampire, Leif's. After Leif assisted Atticus on his battle against the German witches on the previous book, Atticus now had to fulfill his deal to Leif which was, to help him get to Asgard to kill the Norse thunder god, Thor.

There were new characters introduced in Hammered. All of them had grudge on Thor and wanted him dead. Aside from Leif, the werewolf alpha from Arizona, Gunnar, who was also a friend of Atticus joined the team. I have a feeling that the events in this book are going to have so much impact on the succeeding books. Before his battle against the god of love, Aengus Óg, in Hounded, Atticus was pretty much contented in hiding from him. But when he managed to kill him, all the enemies started coming after him one after the other. However, I feel like that after this book, the enemies are going to be even more all out. The premonitions by the Morrigan and Jesus (he's a very nice guy and he even had beer with Atticus) made the whole story even more nerve-wracking and hilarious (of course!) for me.

Like the other books in the series, Hammered overflowed with mesmerizing fight scenes and hilarious characters. Really, if you've read Hounded and Hexed and found them hilarious, brace yourselves because Hammered is twice as fun as the first two books. However, Hammered was also twice as sad as the first two. A character I liked (but you might not) died so I was a bit down when I finished this. But other than that, well, you just have to meet Atticus. The humor was much more memorable here because I could absolutely connect with his dry sense humor. Some of my favorite Atticus moments? (1) That time when he was having a pee pun party with a thousand year old vampire; (2) That time when he showed off his talent of switching language from Shakespeare to LOLcatz; (3) That moment when he sang It's A Small World After All with a vampire, a werewolf, a thunder god, an alchemist and a wizard while being surrounded by Norse giants; and of course, (4) that time when he "squeed" and danced around when he met "Neil F****** Gaiman"! Gods, this series is awesome!

Rating: 4.5/5 stars