This was a difficult book to read. Not because the text was especially dense, the font small or the vocabulary far beyond my own, but rather because it was printed backwards.

As printed, the book begins with the acknowledgements, followed by a glossary (in reverse order, of course), and the page 327, the final page of the novel. The back of the book concludes with a title page, publisher information, dedication, sketch of a viking longship and the prologue on page one.

I'm not sure how that happened, but pretty quickly I got used to reading the right page first, then the left page, then turning pages from left to right to continue reading. Awkward, but it didn't stop me from reading the book.

Otherwise, I thoroughly enjoyed Raider's Wake, the sixth book in James L. Nelson's Norsemen Saga. Thorgrim Night Wolf, our viking hero, remains in Ireland, where his travels took him in the first book in the series, on a raid on the Irish coast. Since then, circumstances -- or fickle gods, who can say? -- have prevented him from returning home to Norway, where he once lived the life of a simple farmer.

Now, he's leading the dull life of a minor lord in the small longphort of Vik-Lo, his temporary home in Ireland, but with weather changing for the better he has decided to test his fate once again. He sets sail with a small fleet of four longships on a new viking raid.

But his foray puts him into a battle of wits and skill with a Frisian merchant named Brunhard, a wily and unscrupulous slave trader who proves too clever to be taken easily by Thorgrim's usual tactics. Brunhard's three ships are loaded down with valuable trade goods, Irish slaves who are chained to the oars, and a paying passenger, the disenfranchised Frankish lord, warrior and former Irish monk Louis de Roumois who has crossed paths with Thorgrim in two previous books.

The contest between Thorgrim and Brunhard will range up and down the Irish coast, and many men (and a few ships) will pay the price of their endeavors. The weather, too -- as well as the treacherous coastline -- will have a role to play as well. Meanwhile, Thorgrim's son Harald will find himself for the first time in command of a ship ... but, without sails, he will be hard pressed to join the coming sea battle.

As always, Nelson has a talent for taking his readers to sea with him, bringing ships and sailors to life with vivid imagery and an excellent grasp of seamanship. Raider's Wake gives readers a well-choreographed game of cat and mouse between two skilled adversaries.