Postcards from Valhalla by Danny Weston ~ Blog Tour & Guest Post

Viggo is fifteen years old, living in Edinburgh with his mum. He has no plans for the future other than to watch the new Thor movie at his local multiplex. But one morning, he wakes to the news that his older brother, Magnus, has gone missing on Shetland. Mum has already booked tickets to go and search for him.

Vikings, a remote Scottish island, a missing brother – this all adds up to an incredibly exciting adventure! Add strange visions and an unexplainable connection to the past and you have a ghostly young adult mystery you won’t be able to put down!

It’s such a pleasure to welcome the author of Postcards from Valhalla, Danny Weston, to Scope for Imagintion with a guest post about making the past relevant to modern readers.

Making the past seem new again

Postcards from Valhalla is set right now, but there are elements within the story that go back to ancient days. So how does a writer make such timeless themes seem relevant to today’s young readers?

It’s a balancing act, I suppose, a way of juxtaposing contemporary imagery with familiar storylines. I find the medium of dreams really useful for this, because what we see when we sleep can transcend time and reality. As my young hero, Viggo, and his mum, Alison, set off in search of Viggo’s older brother, Magnus, Viggo finds himself dreaming a lot – and sometimes the dreams he has are closer to visions, because he’s not always convinced he’s asleep when he ‘sees’ things. But what is causing these visions, which become ever more intense the closer he gets to Magnus?

In an early chapter, Viggo and Alison are driving along a motorway and, up ahead of them, Viggo spots a warrior on a horse riding straight towards them, pointing a massive sword at his heart. Here are two conflicting elements directly juxtaposed: a mounted warrior in armour galloping along a three lane motorway, oblivious to the oncoming traffic.

Later, on the ferry over to Shetland, Viggo is horribly seasick during a storm and, while he’s throwing up over the side of the ferry, he thinks he can see an old Viking longship travelling alongside, churning through the stormy waters. Again, the past and the present clash directly with each other…

And, once in Shetland, the dreams/visions become even more vivid. On one occasion, Viggo even manages to bring something real back from the past – an ancient doll’s house – through the power of what he can see in his mind’s eye. He’s understandably freaked out by this!

Another contemporary element I added to the story is the presence of Zack Strode, an American internet billionaire. Strode is funding Project Valhalla, an excavation on the Northernmost island, Unst. He believes that he’s found the fossilised remains of Ygdrasil, the magical tree of Norse mythology, said to be the gateway to Valhalla, the land of the gods. Strode clearly believes that his wealth puts him on the same level as the gods of old, that he is destined to inherit their powers, purely by virtue of the fact that he’s one of the wealthiest humans on the planet.

But what is waiting down there in the darkness?

Don’t miss the rest of the posts on this fantastic tour!