Njal's Saga

“...Kol was counting out the silver...Kari rushed at him with his sword drawn and slashed at Kol's neck. Kol kept on counting, and his head said ‘Ten' as it flew from his shoulders.”

“[Flosi] walked all the way to Rome, where he was accorded the great honour of receiving absolution at the hands of the Pope himself; he paid a large sum of money for it.”

The writing is so spare and to-the-point that it verges on comedy sometimes. I find the directness novel. No flowery language or wasted words. I guess that's the oral-tradition factor.

A lot of HONOR and stoic dudes that are surprisingly fragile (in terms of masculinity, but also limbs and heads seem to get hacked off with ease).

A multigenerational blood-feud that ends with two survivors of opposite factions becoming buds...as it should be, really.

And there I end my review of the saga of the Burning of Njal.