CHILDREN OF TAX AND TEA IS SET FOR RELEASE ON OCTOBER 9, 2026 AND AVAILABLE FOR PREORDER AT THE RETAILERS SHOWN BELOW (AND EVERYWHERE ELSE HARDBACKS ARE SOLD, TOO).
***Signed copies will also be available at Etsy!***
“And being as Raven-Floki took a page from Larry Bird’s playbook, he started trash-talking Iceland all up and down the fucking court as soon as he got back home to Norway’s western fucking fjords.” —excerpted from the chapter, The Settlement of an Inhospitable Volcanic Rock
Children of Tax and Tea is a full-color, heavily illustrated, humorous hardback book that captures the charmingly profane spirit of foul-mouthed Bostonians who enjoy discussing viking history at public drinking establishments. Basically, imagine a cast of inebriated Mark Wahlberg style movie characters illicitly recorded while unloading all sorts of informative and factual knowledge about the Viking Age on captive audiences. The pearls of Norse wisdom contained in those illuminating barroom discourses form the basis of the book.
“He was addicted to fighting the way people in New York are addicted to being assholes.” —excerpted from the chapter, Harald Bluetooth: Big Tech Bro
The book itself stems from McSweeney’s longest-running column, “Norse History for Bostonians,” created by Rowdy Geirsson in 2010 and illustrated by Matt Smith since 2017, and expands significantly on the extensive online repository with all new text and illustrations. It also provides a smooth-flowing, easy-to-read narrative in standard English while maintaining the original tone of the online column. So that means if you’ve ever wanted to learn more about Harald Fairhair’s egregious taxation without representation policies or the intense Norse-Irish rivalry with old York, you can finally do so without needing to decipher the incomprehensible accent of a drunkard in Southie.
“Personally, I would not want to wear any clothes made by a valkyrie. No—like seriously, I don’t care whether I’m out in public or at home where no one can even see me. I’m not putting on clothes made by a fucking valkyrie. I just don’t like the idea of wearing a t-shirt or jeans or underwear or whatever made out of someone else’s intestines.” —excerpted from the chapter, Weapon-Wielding Women
Children of Tax and Tea consists of 40 chapters with deeply honest and insightful titles about Norse history such as “False Advertising in the Era of Viking Age Exploration,” “Shit Talk at the Law Rock,” and “How to Get Paid to Stop Attacking Paris.” It also includes a special Foreword by the knowledgeable law-speakers of the Saga Thing podcast, Andy Pfrenger and John Sexton. The book was launched on Kickstarter in 2025, achieving “Project We Love” status in August of that year.
A smattering of sample pages is provided below, including the entirety of the chapter titled, Dublin was Built on Stout.
The book is divided into six thematic sections, each of which opens with two full-color introductory spreads as shown here with examples from the Have Longship, Will Travel section.
The full chapter preview of the chapter titled, Dublin was Built on Stout, is below.
A miscellaneous sampling of other pages from the book follows. Skål!
