Book about a Druid with his bacon loving hound fighting gods from multiple pantheons

Question

I remember reading a series about a druid who somehow survived the romans eradicating druids in the past and living for 2.000 years with the help of a special tea. He had an animal companion, a big hound, who had his priorities straight: bacon and poodles. The druid could telepathically communicate with his hound to be informed of the life-threatening situations, such as missing out on the mandatory breakfast sausage. Or lunch.

The whole book was very witty, but reading the thoughts of the hound was probably the best part of it.

Basically nothing much happened for 2.000 years while the druid was hiding but with the beginning of the first book he goes out of hiding and starts to fight some of the gods who have been searching for him for the last 2.000 years.

It starts with old Irish gods and later goes on to Norse gods, Greek gods, Roman gods, Japanese gods, ... Basically he gets drawn into a war between different pantheons where the bad guys from each pantheon were trying to recruit other bad guys and the gods couldn't do anything because they weren't allowed to do anything out of the ordinary according to the religion to which they belonged. Divine politics.

Later he got a female apprentice and tried to make her a druid. This probably happened around book 3 or 4. I've read maybe 5 books and there was supposed to be a total of around 10 books. They were just getting released when I was still reading the series so it can't be much older than a few years.

Random stuff I still remember:

• the druid had an amulet with magical powers
• he could shapeshift into animals
• he preferred not to fight, but still ended up in lots of fights in every book
• the druid could use magic to influence the nature around him
• he could "talk" to the elements by touching the earth and trying to communicate via emotions
• basically all supernatural creatures were found throughout the series: werewolves, vampires, kitsune, ...

I loved the series, but I stopped reading it when there were no newer books, though I know that there were still some books supposed to be written. Can you help me remember the name of the series so that I can continue reading it? Now I am off for some bacon...

Answer 1

Danny3414 really deserves the credit for this one, but since I have the books I'll post an answer. The series is the Iron Druid series by Kevin Hearne.

The eponymous druid is Atticus O'Sullivan and his dog is Oberon. I don't recall bacon being mentioned much (though Oberon is somewhat obsessed with sausages) but Oberon does have a thing about poodles:

Did Genghis Khan take his coffee black? Oberon asked me. After my bathtime story, he wanted to be the Genghis Khan of dogs. He wanted a harem full of French poodles, all of whom were named either Fifi or Bambi. It was an amusing habit of his: Oberon had, in the past, wanted to be Vlad the Impaler, Joan of Arc, Bertrand Russell, and any other historical figure I had recently told him about while he was getting a thorough cleansing. His Liberace period had been particularly good for my soul: You haven‘t lived until you‘ve seen an Irish wolfhound parading around in rhinestone-studded gold lamé.

The apprentice is Granuaile (Granuaile speaking to Atticus):

"Out. Fucking. Standing. Wow."
She leaned forward over the bar again, even closer than she had before. "So here is what I want, Atticus." I could smell her strawberry lip gloss, the peppermint of her breath, and that peculiar scent that I now knew was only half hers: red-wine bouquet mixed with saffron and poppies.
"I want to be your apprentice. Teach me."
"Truly? That is what you want?" I raised my eyebrows.
"Yes. I want to be a Druid."