Reddit reviews A History of the Vikings

>Iona Abbey, perhaps the most important Christian site in all of Britain

If there is a site to compete with Iona, it's Lindisfarne, which was attacked and destroyed by the Vikings in 793. This was a major blow to the English.

About the uniting of England, it's not that the Heptarchy joined forces to fight, but rather all the kingdoms had been overrun with the sole exception of the West Saxons. When King Alfred defeated the Vikings he established himself as overking of all England. His grandson Athelstan was the one who beat the Vikings back once and for all. The Vikings of Dublin (a town they had founded) had united with the Scots and these were defeated by Athelstan in 937. (There really was no uniting with Scotland at this point).

As for sources, pretty much any history of the Vikings will have this information. This one and this one are both good. The basic histories of Anglo-Saxon England will also have the information.

I was actually going to take a class on the Vikings this spring for kicks (main area of study is Near Eastern archaeology). While I ended up not being able to take the class due to time, I did keep the books since they did a pretty good job of introducing the topic to someone who never had any exposure to it before; not to mention they were extremely interesting!

A History of the Vikings by Gwyn Jones: Kind of dry, but very informative and helpful.

Medieval Scandinavia: From Conversion to Reformation, circa 800-1500 (Nordic Series) by Birgit and Peter Sawyer: If I recall correctly, the husband and wife who wrote this are both archaeologists. This was a pretty accesible book.

Vikings: The North Atlantic Saga edited by William F. Fitzhugh and Elisabeth Ward: Lots of information with lots of pictures!

Silver Economy in the Viking Age edited by James Graham-Campbell and Gareth Williams: This is also available on Amazon, but I had originally just bought the e-Book rental through this link. This book mostly concentrates on the archaeology of the Viking Age, if that's what you're looking for. I think I might just buy this book soon, haha.

Hopefully that helped a bit!

--edit--

/r/AskHistorians also seems to recommend The Viking World by Stefan Brink (as mentioned by /u/ThrostThrandson) and Exploring the World of the Vikings by Richard Hall. That subreddit has compiled a pretty extensive book list for a wide variety of subjects, if that interests you as well.

As far as Mythology is concerned, if you are looking for a good non-fiction place to start, I would reccomend "Norse Mythology: A Guide to the Gods, Heroes, Rituals, and Beliefs" by John Lindow

If you are interested in the History and Culture from a non-fiction standpoint, I started with "A History of the Vikings" by Gwyn Jones

I'm sorry, but I don't have a specific source for this right now. My knowledge mainly comes from various books, lectures, youtube channels focused on history or articles from the Internet. But as far as literature is concerned, I can certainly recommend to you History of Vikings by Gwyn Jones, imo it's great starting point for learning more about vikings and Norsemen in general, as it covers wide range of topics in Norse culture, but doesn't get deep enough to confuse you.

That's all i need. I don't care if he takes it from others as long as most of the stuff about Vikings are covered

EDIT: Do you know anything about this one? http://www.amazon.com/A-History-Vikings-Gwyn-Jones/dp/0192801341/ref=cm_lmf_tit_1

I'm quite nervous about buying the wrong book xD