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![Hounded (with two bonus short stories): Book One of The Iron Druid Chronicles by [Kevin Hearne]](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51fNuoHApvL._SY346_.jpg)
Hounded (with two bonus short stories): Book One of The Iron Druid Chronicles Kindle Edition
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“A page-turning and often laugh-out-loud-funny caper through a mix of the modern and the mythic.”—Ari Marmell, author of The Warlord’s Legacy
Atticus O’Sullivan is the last of the ancient druids. He has been on the run for more than two thousand years and he’s tired of it. The Irish gods who want to kill him are after an enchanted sword he stole in a first-century battle, and when they find him managing an occult bookshop in Tempe, Arizona, Atticus doesn’t want to uproot his life again. He just wants everything to end one way or another, but preferably the way in which he can continue to enjoy fish and chips.
He does have some small hope of survival: The Morrigan, the Irish Chooser of the Slain, is on his side, and so is Brighid, First Among the Fae. His lawyer is literally a bloodsucking vampire, and he has a loyal Irish wolfhound with opinions about poodles.
But he’s facing down some mighty enemies: Aenghus Óg, a vengeful Irish god, plus a coven of witches and even the local police. On top of all that, Aenghus has a direct line to the firepower of hell. Atticus will need all the luck of the Irish and more if he’s going to stay alive.
Don’t miss any of The Iron Druid Chronicles:
HOUNDED | HEXED | HAMMERED | TRICKED | TRAPPED | HUNTED | SHATTERED | STAKED | SCOURGED | BESIEGED
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherDel Rey
- Publication dateMay 3, 2011
- File size8843 KB
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Editorial Reviews
Review
“A page-turning and often laugh-out-loud funny caper through a mix of the modern and the mythic.”—Ari Marmell, author of The Warlord’s Legacy
“Celtic mythology and an ancient Druid with modern attitude mix it up in the Arizona desert in this witty new fantasy series.”—Kelly Meding, author of Three Days to Dead
“Kevin Hearne breathes new life into old myths, creating a world both eerily familiar and startlingly original.”—Nicole Peeler, author of Tempest Rising
About the Author
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Chapter 1
There are many perks to living for twenty-one centuries, and foremost among them is bearing witness to the rare birth of genius. It invariably goes like this: Someone shrugs off the weight of his cultural traditions, ignores the baleful stares of authority, and does something his countrymen think to be completely batshit insane. Of those, Galileo was my personal favorite. Van Gogh comes in second, but he really was batshit insane
Thank the Goddess I don’t look like a guy who met Galileo—or who saw Shakespeare’s plays when they first debuted or rode with the hordes of Genghis Khan. When people ask how old I am, I just tell them twenty-one, and if they assume I mean years instead of decades or centuries, then that can’t be my fault, can it? I still get carded, in fact, which any senior citizen will tell you is immensely flattering.
The young-Irish-lad façade does not stand me in good stead when I’m trying to appear scholarly at my place of business—I run an occult bookshop with an apothecary’s counter squeezed in the corner—but it has one outstanding advantage. When I go to the grocery store, for example, and people see my curly red hair, fair skin, and long goatee, they suspect that I play soccer and drink lots of Guinness. If I’m going sleeveless and they see the tattoos all up and down my right arm, they assume I’m in a rock band and smoke lots of weed. It never enters their mind for a moment that I could be an ancient Druid—and that’s the main reason why I like this look. If I grew a white beard and got myself a pointy hat, oozed dignity and sagacity and glowed with beatitude, people might start to get the wrong—or the right—idea.
Sometimes I forget what I look like and I do something out of character, such as sing shepherd tunes in Aramaic while I’m waiting in line at Starbucks, but the nice bit about living in urban America is that people tend to either ignore eccentrics or move to the suburbs to escape them.
That never would have happened in the old days. People who were different back then got burned at the stake or stoned to death. There is still a downside to being different today, of course, which is why I put so much effort into blending in, but the downside is usually just harassment and discrimination, and that is a vast improvement over dying for the common man’s entertainment.
Living in the modern world contains quite a few vast improvements like that. Most old souls I know think the attraction of modernity rests on clever ideas like indoor plumbing and sunglasses. But for me, the true attraction of America is that it’s practically godless. When I was younger and dodging the Romans, I could hardly walk a mile in Europe without stepping on a stone sacred to some god or other. But out here in Arizona, all I have to worry about is the occasional encounter with Coyote, and I actually rather like him. (He’s nothing like Thor, for one thing, and that right there means we’re going to get along fine. The local college kids would describe Thor as a “major asshat” if they ever had the misfortune to meet him.)
Even better than the low god density in Arizona is the near total absence of faeries. I don’t mean those cute winged creatures that Disney calls “fairies”; I mean the Fae, the Sidhe, the actual descendants of the Tuatha Dé Danann, born in Tír na nÓg, the land of eternal youth, each one of them as likely to gut you as hug you. They don’t dig me all that much, so I try to settle in places they can’t reach very easily. They have all sorts of gateways to earth in the Old World, but in the New World they need oak, ash, and thorn to make the journey, and those trees don’t grow together too often in Arizona. I have found a couple of likely places, like the White Mountains near the border with New Mexico and a riparian area near Tucson, but those are both over a hundred miles away from my well-paved neighborhood near the university in Tempe. I figured the chances of the Fae entering the world there and then crossing a treeless desert to look for a rogue Druid were extremely small, so when I found this place in the late nineties, I decided to stay until the locals grew suspicious.
It was a great decision for more than a decade. I set up a new identity, leased some shop space, hung out a sign that said third eye books and herbs (an allusion to Vedic and Buddhist beliefs, because I thought a Celtic name would bring up a red flag to those searching for me), and bought a small house within easy biking distance.
I sold crystals and Tarot cards to college kids who wanted to shock their Protestant parents, scores of ridiculous tomes with “spells” in them for lovey-dovey Wiccans, and some herbal remedies for people looking to make an end run around the doctor’s office. I even stocked extensive works on Druid magic, all of them based on Victorian revivals, all of them utter rubbish, and all vastly entertaining to me whenever I sold any of them. Maybe once a month I had a serious magical customer looking for a genuine grimoire, stuff you don’t mess with or even know about until you’re fairly accomplished. I did much more of my rare book business via the Internet—another vast improvement of modern times.
But when I set up my identity and my place of business, I did not realize how easy it would be for someone else to find me by doing a public-records search on the Internet. The idea that any of the Old Ones would even try it never occurred to me—I thought they’d tryto scry me or use other methods of divination, but never the Internet—so I was not as careful in choosing my name as I should have been. I should have called myself John Smith or something utterly sad and plain like that, but my pride would not let me wear a Christian name. So I used O’Sullivan, the Anglicized version of my real surname, and for everyday usage I employed the decidedly Greek name of Atticus. A supposedly twenty-one-year-old O’Sullivan who owned an occult bookstore and sold extremely rare books he had no business knowing about was enough information for the Fae to find me, though.
On a Friday three weeks before Samhain, they jumped me in front of my shop when I walked outside to take a lunch break. A sword swished below my knees without so much as a “Have at thee!” and the arm swinging it pulled its owner off balance when I jumped over it. I crunched a quick left elbow into his face as he tried to recover, and that was one faery down, four to go.
Thank the Gods Below for paranoia. I classified it as a survival skill rather than a neurotic condition; it was a keen knife’s edge, sharpened for centuries against the grindstone of People Who Want to Kill Me. It was what made me wear an amulet of cold iron around my neck, and cloak my shop not only with iron bars, but also with magical wards designed to keep out the Fae and other undesirables. It was what made me train in unarmed combat and test my speed against vampires, and what had saved me countless times from thugs like these.
Perhaps thug is too heavy a word for them; it connotes an abundance of muscle tissue and a profound want of intellect. These lads didn’t look as if they had ever hit the gym or heard of anabolic steroids. They were lean, ropy types who had chosen to disguise themselves as cross-country runners, bare-chested and wearing nothing but maroon shorts and expensive running shoes. To any passerby it would look as if they were trying to beat me up with brooms, but that was just a glamour they had cast on their weapons. The pointy parts were in the twigs, so if I was unable to see through their illusions, I would have been fatally surprised when the nice broom stabbed my vitals. Since I could see through faerie glamours, I noticed that two of my remaining four assailants carried spears, and one of them was circling around to my right. Underneath their human guises, they looked like the typical faery—that is, no wings, scantily clad, and kind of man-pretty like Orlando Bloom’s Legolas, the sort of people you see in salon product advertisements. The ones with spears stabbed at me simultaneously from the sides, but I slapped the tips away with either wrist so that they thrust past me to the front and back. Then I lunged inside the guard of the one to the right and clotheslined him with a forearm to his throat. Tough to breathe through a crushed windpipe. Two down now; but they were quick and deft, and their dark eyes held no gleam of mercy.
I had left my back open to attack by lunging to the right, so I spun and raised my left forearm high to block the blow I knew was coming. Sure enough, there was a sword about to arc down into my skull, and I caught it on my arm at the top of the swing. It bit down to the bone, and that hurt a lot, but not nearly as much as it would have if I had let it fall. I grimaced at the pain and stepped forward to deliver a punishing open-hand blow to the faery’s solar plexus, and he flew back into the wall of my shop—the wall ribbed with bars of iron. Three down, and I smiled at the remaining two, who were not so zealous as before to take a shot at me. Three of their buddies had not only been physically beaten but also magically poisoned by physical contact with me. My cold iron amulet was bound to my aura, and by now they could no doubt see it: I was the Iron Druid, their worst nightmare made flesh, and they might not have been told who they were sent to ambush. My first victim was already disintegrating into ash, and the other two were close to realizing that all we are is dust in the wind.
--This text refers to the paperback edition.Review
“A page-turning and often laugh-out-loud funny caper through a mix of the modern and the mythic.”—Ari Marmell, author of The Warlord’s Legacy
“Celtic mythology and an ancient Druid with modern attitude mix it up in the Arizona desert in this witty new fantasy series.”—Kelly Meding, author of Three Days to Dead
“Kevin Hearne breathes new life into old myths, creating a world both eerily familiar and startlingly original.”—Nicole Peeler, author of Tempest Rising --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.
Product details
- ASIN : B004J4WN0I
- Publisher : Del Rey (May 3, 2011)
- Publication date : May 3, 2011
- Language : English
- File size : 8843 KB
- Text-to-Speech : Enabled
- Screen Reader : Supported
- Enhanced typesetting : Enabled
- X-Ray : Enabled
- Word Wise : Enabled
- Sticky notes : On Kindle Scribe
- Print length : 320 pages
- Best Sellers Rank: #28,119 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #52 in Contemporary Fantasy Fiction
- #232 in Fantasy Adventure Fiction
- #767 in Fantasy Action & Adventure
- Customer Reviews:
About the author

KEVIN HEARNE hugs trees, pets doggies, and rocks out to heavy metal. He also thinks tacos are a pretty nifty idea. He is the author of the New York Times bestselling series the Iron Druid Chronicles, the Seven Kennings trilogy that begins with A PLAGUE OF GIANTS, and co-author of the Tales of Pell with Delilah S. Dawson.
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Reviewed in the United States on July 17, 2017
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This time Atticus decides to stay and fight rather than run. He has some help. He has an Irish wolfhound who is his closest companion. He has the help, usually, of The Morrigan, a crow in form who is the Irish Chooser Of The Slain although her support is always questionable as she can change in the blink of an eye. The first of the Fae is on Atticus' side but only because they share a common enemy. He has a tentative relationship with a local coven of witches but Atticus doesn't trust them at all. He does trust his lawyers, a werewolf who does the day work and a vampire who takes the night shift.
But his enemies are powerful. The Irish God of Love has hated Atticus for centuries and has chased him across the world. He wants to become the ruler of the Faes and knows he will have a better chance of that if he can eliminate Atticus first. He also has entry to the demons of hell and can call on them in a fight as well as his own witches. Can Atticus survive this latest challenge?
Kevin Hearne has created a memorable character in Atticus. He is a native of Arizona so he gets the locale perfectly. His writing style is light and humorous and the reader will fall in love with Atticus and his wolfhound. This is the perfect first novel in a series; it can be read as a stand-alone tale without cliffhangers but it's so delightful that the reader will be interested in reading more of Atticus' adventures. This book is recommended for fantasy readers.
As fans of The Iron Druid Chronicles already know, our star Atticus O’Sullivan seems to be a normal twenty-something guy living peacefully in Arizona. He runs his own occult bookshop, sells some coffee and herbs, and has to constantly tell people he doesn’t sell marijuana at his shop. In his spare time, he keeps up the yard for his elderly next-door neighbor and acts like any other handsome, tattooed, Irish guy: hanging out with his friends, picking up interesting ladies, and taking his Irish Wolfhound Oberon out for hikes in the spectacular wilderness. But actually, our normal dude is much more than he seems!
In fact, he is the last of the druids, which makes him about twenty-one “centuries” old. Not only that, but those friends of his are actually werewolves and vampires; those hot ladies he keeps having sex with are Celtic goddesses; and when he and Oberon go hiking, Atticus generally shape-shifts into animal forms so he can keep up with the werewolf pack. All of which means he has a really good thing going on in Arizona. One of the happiest, most settled times in his long life. Naturally though, something is happening to screw it up.
You see, our druid has a magic sword that he took off a Celtic god’s champion centuries ago. This god is still pissed after all this time and wants it back. (Guess divine beings have long memories or something?) Unfortunately, after hounding (Yeah, I went there) our druid for centuries, this god has finally tracked him down, and Atticus is going to need all his druidic power and tricks (plus a little help from old and new friends alike) to save his ass from this very deadly situation, because even if death won’t take his soul hell still might!
Overall, I thought Hounded was a fun read. Was it as good as other urban fantasy books? I have no idea, because this is my first, so it will be the measure upon which I judge all those that come after. Sort of like my first . . . uh, real girlfriend. But like I was saying, this story had some really cool Celtic gods and goddess, interesting witches, and a couple of great werewolf and vampire characters. Naturally, Atticus was the star of the show; his sarcastic, funny remarks kept the laughs coming, and his very interesting relationship with Oberon the wolfhound was a source of numerous smiles. Truthfully, these two friend’s constant banter was the best thing about the whole story to me.
I really have only two complaints this book.
One, Atticus didn’t seem like a twenty-one CENTURIES old druid. I understand that he’d want to fit into the time period he was living in, dress normal, talk with the local language and slang, and not draw attention to himself, but there did not seem to be much history with this guy. He sounded and acted like a hormonal, twenty-one-year-old frat boy, not like someone who had lived, loved and lost countless people in such a long life. Surviving that long and experiencing so much of human history would have to affect you in some way. There would be moments when you sat around and reflected on something you saw or did or someone important you had lost. Since there were none of these moments in Hounded, it added to the impression that Atticus was a normal, twenty-first century, American man.
Two, the whole book built up to this epic confrontation between Atticus and this kickass Celtic god. After this big buildup though, things wrapped up a little quickly and too perfectly for me.
Like I said earlier, however, I really enjoyed Hounded; it was a fun introduction to urban fantasy and sold me on continuing to read the genre.
Top reviews from other countries

So what makes a good fantasy? Humour. I don't mean that stories need to be comedic. if you look at real life people humour is always present. if you are in a profession that is tense with great responsibility, like EMTs or Firemen, soldiers, pilots and so on, you'll alwys find humour because it reduces tension. Real people make light of situations.
And so we come to the Iron Druid. a 2100-year-old iron-age man. he is hunted by gods as well as mundane police at various stages.
His appearance is that of a young 20-something but his mind, and thus the internal dialog we hear, is 2100 years old. So his attitudes are necessarily more primitive, though given that he has lived so long, those primitive attitudes have unergone some refining and he embraces most of the modern lifestyle choices.
Hmour is ever present though. In conversations with his dog, Oberon, with the werewolves and vampires and humans. It makes it seem real and thus very easy to submerse yourself in the caharacters and environment. Thats not to say there are no serious action scenes.
There are no super gory long drawn out posturing battles. He's an iron-age fighter, so the idea is, kill them before they kill you. there are no rules.
It's very refreshing.
The quality of writing is escellent throughout. Good characterisation, a plot that you can see has run for millenia and is likely to continue.
The treatment of the druids, history of the old Irish religion, vampires, werewolves, norse gods, graeco-roman gods and sundry others are logically consistent and feel real. And that is what makes a Great Fantasy.
I really recommend getting the entire series (it's discounted) and also the Audobooks as that helps immensely with the pronounciation.
Enjoy yourself with this, and may harmony find you.

Atticus is a 2100 year old magic bearing druid who runs a book and herb tea shop in Arizona. He's been on the run from a god for centuries since stealing his mythical sword fragarach during battle, though the God in question Aenghus, was using it for destruction.
Atticus, as a druid, is about earth and healing. However that doesn't mean he's not dangerous.
This urban fantasy combining nordic and Irish mythology, adventure and sardonic wit, finds Atticus being hunted by the god, but he has allies. His lawyers are both Vikings - one a werewolf, one a vampire, the Morrigan promises not to take him if he dies, there's a very attractive yet unusual barmaid set to help him, and a lovely old Irish whiskey drinking neighbour pensioner who helps him bury bodies.
Best of all though is best buddy Oberon - his Irish wolfhound rescue, who lives sausages and poodles.
Hearne writes the dialogue between the two friends - magic of course - and Oberon is funny, sarcastic but also so loving and adorable.
Atticus is cheeky at times but also honourable.
It's a great cast of characters that fans of Jim Butcher or Kim Harrison will love.
And given the amount of research, which is evident but not info dumped, it works well.


So, I started doing some searches, books like.........
Got a lot of results! Mostly stuff I've read and a lot of stuff I know isn't relevant.
However I spot this gem in the pile and delve deeper. An Irish Druid! The last Druid! And he's an o'sullivan?!!
I couldn't turn back now! What an excellent name choice(truly inspired)
Then I realised the whole pantheon of Irish gods and myths are thrown in too, with Norse werewolves and Icelandic vampires and polish witches? Not to mention mellow Irish widows and smart ass Irish wolfhounds! With a yarn fit for a bard tying the whole thing together.
Overall a quick action packed adrenaline ride from start to finish! Ive got another great series to enjoy😀
