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foolishcatalyst 's review for:
The Gospel of Loki
by Joanne M. Harris
The Gospel of Loki has been on my radar for a few years, and I was so pleased to pick up a brand new looking copy for a euro donation in a weird little cafe in the middle of nowhere. It felt like fate had dropped this book into my lap... and maybe it did, but honestly screw fate.
I should have given up after the first few chapters, but I was determined to enjoy this.
Honestly, this is a Norse myth retelling with a gimmick, and it's a gimmick that SHOULD work, but Loki just isn't interesting. He doesn't contribute to half the stories he tells, but he also doesn't editorialise like I would have expected from the trickster god. When he DOES contribute to the stories, it often feels like things are just happening to him. No attempts are made to make it feel like Loki has any control over the events he describes - which if this was a straightforward recounting of the myths would be fair enough, but Loki is the storyteller here. Every so often, the author seems to realise that Our Humble Narrator hasn't said anything boastful in a while, and will insert a line about how fabulous he is, and that's the extent of Loki's personality for most of the book.
It does get better in the last third, when the story gets a bit more personal for Loki, but that doesn't make up for the complete banality of everything that came before. Harris also does a good job at stringing together a bunch of different stories to form a cohesive narrative, which might make this more accessible for anybody unfamiliar with the mythology. There are some weird changes (Pandaemonium, what?) that I presume happened because this is a prequel to Runemarks, so maybe fans of that book would get more out of this as well.
Overall, this book just felt like a waste of that gorgeous cover art.
I should have given up after the first few chapters, but I was determined to enjoy this.
Honestly, this is a Norse myth retelling with a gimmick, and it's a gimmick that SHOULD work, but Loki just isn't interesting. He doesn't contribute to half the stories he tells, but he also doesn't editorialise like I would have expected from the trickster god. When he DOES contribute to the stories, it often feels like things are just happening to him. No attempts are made to make it feel like Loki has any control over the events he describes - which if this was a straightforward recounting of the myths would be fair enough, but Loki is the storyteller here. Every so often, the author seems to realise that Our Humble Narrator hasn't said anything boastful in a while, and will insert a line about how fabulous he is, and that's the extent of Loki's personality for most of the book.
It does get better in the last third, when the story gets a bit more personal for Loki, but that doesn't make up for the complete banality of everything that came before. Harris also does a good job at stringing together a bunch of different stories to form a cohesive narrative, which might make this more accessible for anybody unfamiliar with the mythology. There are some weird changes (Pandaemonium, what?) that I presume happened because this is a prequel to Runemarks, so maybe fans of that book would get more out of this as well.
Overall, this book just felt like a waste of that gorgeous cover art.