‘A vivid evocation of an ancient land...Betsy Tobin combines the sensuality of Angela Carter with a profound feeling for a violent, unstable and fascinating landscape…this world pulses with subversion and unexpected passion. An elegy not merely to a different age…but also crucially to a tradition of storytelling; the gathering around a bright fire to hear tales of hardship, magic and love. It is surprising just how resonant they still are.’      

Saturday Telegraph 

 

‘Betsy Tobin captures this world in all its complexity: the fierce feuds, the slyness and warmth of a people who will sacrifice a daughter to kin, and slit the throat of kin for the sake of a stranger. Here is a world where magic and mystery rise from the currents of nature and not in defiance of it.’    

 Independent on Sunday 

 

‘The novels of Betsy Tobin are dark and bloody, sensual and mythic. They are also set in a past that, thanks to her skill at inhabiting her characters, seems often more immediate than the world around us…Tobin inhabits this pagan land with the passion and intensity of her characters.’      

Observer 

 

‘Ice Land is a lyrically written epic inspired by the beauty and history of that island, and the rich world of Norse mythology that infuses it…Indeed the novel grafts a modern sensibility on to ancient myth and is as much a contemplation of love and relationships as an epic adventure…Tobin finds female complexity at the heart of Norse mythology.’      Sunday Telegraph 

 

‘One does not often meet a heroine with the power of flight, but Betsy Tobin's characters are hardly ordinary people…Not just a good story, but one of the greatest - told very nicely.’   The Times