Johanne Hildebrandt Books In Order

Publication Order of Valhalla Books

Johanne Hildebrandt is a Swedish author that writes novels that delve into Nordic history and folklores. It wasn’t until the mid-2010s that the author began making waves outside the Nordic countries.

+Biography

Born in 1964 in Lycksele, Johanne first garnered a reputation as a journalist before she wrote novels. For many people, there is no better war correspondent in Sweden than Johanne Hildebrandt whose career saw her follow her nation’s soldiers into Afghanistan.

At one time, Johanne’s face was pretty common on television and in the newspapers where she was seen living among the civilians of war torn nations and bringing their heartbreaking stories to Swedes.

The author’s journalistic efforts have been collected in various books and documentaries, this while Johanne has continued to build her renown as a columnist.

As a child, it was not immediately clear that Johanne Hildebrandt would go on to write novels. By the time she was eighteen, Johanne was on a freighter working alongside older men and women and gaining deep insight into the ways of the world and its people.

In the years that followed, the author only seemed to slip further from the publishing arena, eventually advancing until she was training drivers. Things began to look up for the author when she injected some effort into her educational pursuits.

Johanne did her schooling at a high school level at Komvux, an adult education institute designed to provide adults with elementary and secondary level knowledge. After Komvux, Johanne found her way to Vaxjo University, starting at the information line and slowly making her way through the programs until she acquired the knowledge necessary to acquire a job at a local newspaper.

Johanne Hildebrandt worked as a reporter in Karlshamn for two years. It is arguable that Johanne had any grand plans as a reporter. One assumes that she had a knack for writing and reporting gave her the opportunity to put her skills to good use. One can also assume that she loved bringing other people’s stories to her readers.

Either way, the author’s ascent is directly connected to the outbreak of the Yugoslav Wars. The conflicts began in the early 1990s when Johanne was on vacation in Croatia. Seeing what was happening, Johanne decided that she would cover the war. That meant becoming a war correspondent and marching into one of the most dangerous places in the world at the time.

Johanne wasn’t intimidated and spent ten years in the Balkans watching the wars and insurgencies unfold. The author’s first book was called ‘Blackout’. Released in 2001, the book was the culmination of Johanne’s experience with war.

The book provided a personal and intimate account of Johanne’s time as a war reporter, and it did such an impressive job of taking readers to the war that the author won various accolades for the book.

Rather than following ‘Blackout’ with another nonfiction book, Johanne decided to immediately go into fiction, eventually publishing the Valhalla trilogy. The first book in the series came out just a year after ‘Blackout’, a smart marketing decision because it allowed Johanne to take advantage of the press she was getting for ‘Blackout’ to sell her fiction works.

The trilogy went on to sell hundreds of thousands of copies. This spurred Johanne Hildebrandt on to produce even more fiction. By the mid-2000s, Johanne was pretty adamant about her decision to quit being a war reporter.

But she did not quit journalism and proceeded to write numerous columns for Svenska Dagbladet. Johanne left the war game on a high note, having been to all the hotspots during her notable journalism career, this including Pakistan, Sudan, Chad, and Afghanistan.

The author’s work also saw her take a journalism award home for her war reporting efforts. It is worth noting that it took a few years but Johanne began flirting with the idea of war reporting once again.

Her decision to publish a book that delved into her experiences as a reporter in Iraq suggested that she missed the war reporting game. Even more telling was Johanne Hildebrandt’s decision to follow a team of Swedish soldiers in Afghanistan around.

The undertaking took six months and it was designed to help Johanne write another book. The book was groundbreaking in the way it portrayed the actions of Swedish soldiers in battle against insurgents. And it showed that there was still a bit of the war correspondent hiding behind Johanne’s fiction author hat. The book, it should be noted, was praised for reminding Swedes of the emergence of war in their society and the increasingly active role they were taking in the affairs of other countries.

If you have never heard of Johanne Hildebrandt the journalist, though, do not feel too bad. Johanne’s star tends to shine brightest in Sweden. It is there that her war reporting has garnered her the most attention.

And even as an author, Johanna Hildebrandt has spent her career writing for her fellow countrymen. It wasn’t until the mid-2010s that the author began producing fiction with wider appeal.

Some of the author’s achievements include being the first woman to be selected in the Royal Academy of Sciences Department 1 since it came into being in 1796. Johanne was also named Guest Professor at Karlstad University.

+The Unbroken Line of the Moon.

Sigrid has never wavered in her belief in the old Nordic gods. Indeed, Sigrid has had the pleasure of having the goddess Freya visit her dreams. As a result of those dreams, Sigrid has the ability to see into the future.

Sigrid has been blessed in more ways than one. She is not only beautiful but quite rich and clever. And she finds that she is able to use her visions of the future to maneuver the dangerous politics that surround the war between the Christians and the Vikings.

Sigrid stumbles into a tight spot when she agrees with her father’s wishes to marry a local king in the belief that it is Freya’s will, only to realize that her destiny is to fall for a dangerous warrior.

+Estrid

Queen Sigrid knows what she wants and she won’t stop until her dreams come true. They include seeing her son Olaf take the Svealand Kingdom as heir and her daughter Estrid fulfilling a pledge to the Norse goddess of death by securing passage to the underworld.

However, to see her dreams fulfilled, Sigrid must overcome her former husband who isn’t so certain that he sired Sigrid’s twins.