Somewhere in the editorial process I was asked to consider writing up an appendix with descriptions of the various Norse gods and monsters. The thinking was that at least some of my readers would be coming to Thunder Road and to the Norse myth cycle with little or no familiarity with Loki, Thor or Odin, let alone dvergar, einherjar, or Gleipnir.

I also wanted to ensure that this appendix was something that wouldn’t also be readily available on Wikipedia either, and so I decided to write the appendix in Loki’s voice. There were a couple of excellent reasons for this. First, early readers of Thunder Road really responded to the way I wrote the character. Second, and more importantly, he’s the god of lies and trickery, so I can bend his words to my purposes (ignore the author tenting his fingers and laughing maniacally).

Over the next few weeks, I’ll be posting the entries from Loki’s Guide here on the blog (and my haunts on Facebook and Twitter) for your amusement. Along the way, I’ll probably include some annotations such as: why it’s hard to write Loki, or: why Thor is a dick.

Tomorrow: Loki’s Guide to Norse Mythology features…Loki. (C’mon, of course he’d start with himself)