Odd and the Frost Giants

The book "Odd and the Frost Giants" by Neil Gaiman is a very short read, consisting of only 117 pages with large margins and text. However, it is a great story, and is sure to please younger audiences.

It tells a story during the Viking era about how Odd, a very unfortunate (his father died during a sea raid on Scotland and a tree fell on one of his legs) 12-year-old boy, while venturing out into the woods during an abnormally long winter, met up with three talking animals (a bear, an eagle, and a fox). The true forms of the said animals were actually the Norse gods Thor, Odin, and Loki respectively. The reason why the three gods were transformed into animals and were in Midgard (the regular Earth) instead of Asgard (the city of gods) was because the Frost Giants, a group of giant humans with icicles and the like on their bodies, had banished them from Asgard (for reasons explained later in the story), and forced Heimdall (a god who had the power of transportation between the two worlds) to transport them to Midgard.

Odd took them to his home, where he took care of them for a night. The next morning, he decided to venture to Asgard in order to restore the gods' places there. However, getting to Asgard was very tricky during the wintertime, since you had to have a rainbow in order to get there, and all the water was frozen. However, Odd refused to give up, and after some experimentation with a frozen waterfall, different materials in an attempt to melt the ice, and a little help from the three banished gods, they were finally able to create a rainbow to Asgard.

Upon arrival to Asgard, Odd noticed the dimensions were twisted in a way: everyone was bigger here than they were on Midgard. After some refreshments and rest, Odd decided to venture to the Frost Giants' residency, Jotunheim (Giant's Place) to meet up with them and restore order to Asgard. One giant saw him and asked why he had come. He replied that he wanted the gods back in their proper places in Asgard. At first, the giant refused, since the gods had supposedly cheated the Frost Giants as a whole out of a dare (involving building a wall in a certain amount of time), but Odd stood his ground, and after repeatedly lengthening the discussion and changing the subject, he finally found something to satisfy him. Odd pulled out a wood carving that he found earlier while in the woods, even before he found the animals, and that satisfied the Frost Giant, and he left and let the gods have their places in Asgard.

At the table of gods and goddesses in Asgard, Odd was invited to a majestic feast, and all three gods in their animal forms were transformed into their original selves. Everyone at the feast thanked Odd for bringing back the three gods to Asgard once more. As a side result of the Frost Giants' retreat, the long winter in Midgard ended, and he finally went home without anyone in Midgard knowing about what happened right above their heads.

Overall, the book was a short but great read, and is useful if you want to fit a book into a tight schedule. Its length doesn't downplay its quality, and the storyline flowed smoothly. Also, for laughs, check out the text in parentheses in the author biography at the end of the book!