Valley - Valley of the Guardians
Valley - Valley of the Guardians is a fantasy novel by the British writer Jonathan Stroud . The work was published under the English original title Heroes of the Valley 2009. The German translation, 493 pages long, went on sale in January 2009. The fictional main characters are the young Hal Svensson and his girlfriend Aud Ulfar's daughter.
main characters
The main characters of the novel come from three different houses:
Sven's house:
- Arnkel, head of the family
- Astrid, arbitrator of the family
- Leif, her eldest son
- Gudny, her daughter
- Hal, their youngest son
- Brodir, Arnkel's brother
- Katla, neck nurse
Hakon's house:
- Hord, head of the family
- Olaf, his brother
- Ragnar, son of Hord
Arne's house:
- Ulfar, head and arbitrator of the family
- Aud, his daughter
action
The action takes place in a valley, the edge of which on the mountain ranges has been guarded for a long time by the grave monuments of the ancestors of Trolden, powerful and threatening mythical creatures, which the generation in which the main characters live, however, has never seen. The settlers in the valley belong to twelve different "houses", each named after one of the twelve heroes - including Sven - who wrested the valley from the Trolden at the time of the ancestors and who worked together to save their lives in the "Battle of the Troldfelsen" of the valley sacrificed. Driven by curiosity and a thirst for adventure, Hal and Aud begin to explore the border areas of the valley despite the strictest prohibitions and warnings.
The book is divided into 29 untitled chapters. Each chapter is preceded by a short prologue in which someone tells the old legends about the hero Sven.
scene of action
The valley in which the action takes place stretches from the "steep mountains" in the west to the sea coast in the east. The western part, the Obertal, is separated from the larger Untertal in the east by a narrow, difficult to pass gorge with waterfalls. In the Obertal are the houses Gisli, Gest, Rurik and Sven, in the Untertal the houses Eirik, Thord, Egil, Ketil, Arne, Erlend, Hakon and Orm. Hal comes from the Sven house, Aud from the Arne house. In the north as in the south the valley is delimited by mountain ranges. The settlers of the valley mainly cultivate and raise livestock.
literature
English original title:
- Jonathan Stroud: Heroes of the Valley . Hyperion books, 2009, ISBN 978-1-4231-0966-2 .
German translation:
- Valley - Valley of the Guardians . cbj, ISBN 978-3-570-13493-1 (493 pages).
Individual evidence
- ^ Valley - Valley of the Guardians at cbj, Random House publishing group.