"Witch's Heart" Discuss Everything *Spoilers*

[SFFBC, Ancillary Mod]

Non-spoiler thread here: First impressions

[Ryan, Your favourite moderators favourite moderator]

Genevieve Gornichec's website has provided some questions for book clubs to discuss The Witch's Heart. I think that applies to us :)

https://issuu.com/prhlibrary/docs/wit...

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

I. This book draws strongly on Norse mythology. Which of these gods and goddesses were you familiar with and which were new to you? How did the author's depictions of the deities you knew compare to the images you already had of them? Do you think basing a novel on already established characters makes it easier or harder to write?

2. The book starts out with Loki literally giving Angrboda her heart back. What does that signify about their relationship? Do you think it is a significant reason that she trusts him even though she knows he is Odin's blood brother and a trickster?

3. After Angrboda becomes a mother, her priorities shift a great deal.

How does becoming a mother change her outlook on the world and define her goals?

4. Even though Loki is known to be a trickster god, Angrboda trusted him. Did you? Were you surprised by his betrayal or did you see it coming?

5. Angrboda and Skadi's relationship is one of the most important and enduring in Angrboda's life. Describe how their relationship changes over time. How does Angrboda and Skadi's relationship compare to Angrboda and Loki's relationship?

6. Who was your favorite character in the book and why? Who was your least favorite?

7. The author scatters in tidbits of Viking Age material culture (like nalbinding) even though the book takes place in a mythic version of the past. Did you find the portrayal of Viking Age culture evocative and did you learn anything about how people in those times lived?

8. Near the end of the book Angrboda has a moment when she wonders if Loki and Odin have been plotting together during the entire book. Do you think there is any possibility of that?

9. Angrboda has visions of the future and a strong notion of what her fate-and the fate of her children-will be, even though she hopes she can change it. Do you consider knowing the future a gift or a curse? Loki refused to hear his wife's prophecies would you do the same? Do you think he knew more than he let on?

10. The end of the book depicts the end of the world as Angrboda knew it with Ragnarok, yet she ensures that her daughter will find a new life and her legacy will live on in stories. Did the ending make you happy, sad, or a mix of both?

[Ryan, Your favourite moderators favourite moderator]

So... its incredibly hard to write an engaging story where the pov character is a stay at home mother who actually stays at home. To have that character also be the partner of Loki didn't make the story any more engrossing. Lord, I hate that there's a fandom for that irritating and far from genius Trickster God*.

Reading The Witch's Heart almost felt like someone recounting their read of The Gospel of Loki. A passive account of walking a well trodden path after heavy rainfall.

I wish there was a reason to actually like (or hate) this, but I just didn't care and I'm not convinced that knowing how it would all end made a difference to that.

* Apologies if you're an enthusiastic member of that fandom. We all have our flaws.

[Ryan, Your favourite moderators favourite moderator]

I like slice of life, but there wasn't much life in this slice. After establishing that potions are traded to provide Aggy with things to survive we don't really get anything other than the dread of her vision of the apocalypse that her children would bring about.
I shouldn't really complain about things related to the vision of Ragnarok but the whole naive mother who refuses to believe her kids can be bad isn't very convincing when said mother can see the future. The balance between caring about your offspring and caring about everyone else needed to be done better for me, but maybe that's an issue of the source material rather than Gornichec's writing.

[Kristenelle]

Hahaha, Ryan, I agree. I read this last year and thought it was ok, but kind of boring. Action stuff is happening, but our perspective is from a cave most of the book.

I personally felt a little disappointed that the female friend turned into a lover. I'm all for lgbt+ representation, but I also love female friendship representation. I was loving that friendship and didn't need it to turn into anything more.

[Anushree]

i think what the problem with books like this and circe is that they are very loosely based on myth and most part of myth is taken up for interpretation bu authors. Despite being inspired by Norse, it is just secondary. We are introduced to Norse gods , Loki being the primary one but each of his myth are secondary, to the point that it was unnecessary and removing all those parts would have changed nothing. Either you take inspiration and write a fiction or you honour mythological stories and make use of them for plotlines. This book could not stay either charater centric or plot centric, and that made a mess.

[Gregory]

I love Norse myths, and I like it when modern authors fill in some of the massive gaps left by the eddas and sagas. This was probably the last book I'll read with the "Loki was just misunderstood" trope, though. Despite my dislike for that angle, I still enjoyed the book.

I think I might be more interested in the author than this particular book though. The prose was clear and easy to follow without being simplistic or condescending. Gornichec really knows her source material. I'm excited to see what she does next.

[Carro]

Ryan wrote: "So... its incredibly hard to write an engaging story where the pov character is a stay at home mother who actually stays at home. To have that character also be the partner of Loki didn't make the ..."
Thank you. I think that decides me - giving up and not continuing.

BTW one thing I do want to know - does Loki's 8 legged foal ever appear again in the story? Does the poor thing come to a sticky end ?

[Mareike]

I’m about 2 hours and 13 minutes into the audiobook and I would like the record to show that I, too, would be more upset about Skadi taking a husband than about Loki taking a wife. 😂

[Allison, Fairy Mod-mother]

Carro, I'll message you

[Anjali]

halfway through and such seemingly flimsy reasons to betray someone

[Allison, Fairy Mod-mother]

I have yet to find someone who breathes the life and horror and wonder into the Ragnarok saga that I'd expect. I thought this was inoffensive, but I'm not sure what it really did. It announced a mother for Fenrir, Hel and Jormungand, it explained why Odin knew "women's magic", kinda...but did it add? Did it flesh out the saga? Or did it just say the same stuff from another perspective? Did it tell us something new?

Retellings are great and all, but this read more like fanfic to me than a novel with its own concept. It felt like an insert into the existing Norse apocrypha--the only real written myth we have of Ragnarok was the Prose and Poetic Edda which was written in the 1300s by a dude so obnoxious that his own son joined in his murder, and which was attempting to join the local pantheon to Christianity. The majority of what we "see" in Ragnarok came from an opera written like 400 something years after that.

So I guess I don't feel that I know any of the characters better, or felt the end of the gods, or the loss of the children or anything any differently than I had before, when they were just Loki's weird kids.

What about you?

[Anjali]

hm it was a fun read at the end, granted I don't know too much about norse mythology

[Susan]

I have been a fan of Norse Mythology since I was a child and I would repeatedly check out Norse Gods and Giants by the D’Aulaires from the library. I thoroughly enjoyed reading The Witch’s Heart and seeing the myths from an obscure participant. Like much of surviving mythology, they are tales of old and new gods fight for supremacy, Vanir vs Aesir, vs older even still gods like Angrboda and the Jotun. Christianity was their end and Christians greatly influenced Ragnarok. I was lucky enough to attend a panel at Emerald City Comicon where the author spoke and that is how I found the book. I look forward to more books from her.

[Jenni]

I really enjoyed this book, but I admit, I have very limited knowledge of Norse mythology. I mean I have heard of a lot of the Norse gods and goddesses, but I don't really know much about their stories. So I didn't really come at this with any prior knowledge to compare/contrast.

I had never heard of Angrboda though and never knew Loki had been married. I had heard of Fenrir and Sleepneir though, but didn't know about Jormangand or Hel.

I imagine it must be difficult to write a book with characters that were already created. You have to stay true to the characters just enough to appease the fan-base, but also have enough original content for you to call it your own.

As far as Loki giving back Angboda's heart. I feel like this act is what may caused Angrboda to be so forgiving and tolerating of Loki's treatment of her. I think she may have stayed with him for a lot longer than he deserved because of it. It's like that friend that does something nice for you and brings it up every so often years and years later. Yes, it was nice of him to do that, but eventually the debt is repaid and it doesn't need to keep getting brought up.

I kind of was surprised by Loki's betrayal even though I guess I shouldn't have been. It really seemed like the birth of his daughter had brought out a new Loki and he was turning over a new leaf. I enjoyed that part of the book. I feel like I grieved with Angrboda when he betrayed her, but mostly I kept thinking about the children and how confused they must have been. I feel like I had a little anxiety reading all the traveling parts that occurred afterwards. I kept thinking about how much time was passing and how alone the children were for so very long. And I was having some negative feelings towards Angrboda in this part of the book too because of how much time was passing. I didn't really think the author made it sound like Angrboda was trying very hard to reach out to her children or get her magic back.

[Linliny]

I thought the book was interesting, but mostly because I don't know the Norse myths very well. It was kind of weird reading the story from Angrboda's perspective. To my understanding, she's barely mentioned in the Prose and Poetic Edda besides being the mother of monsters, so you'd think she could have had a bit more free reign in the story instead of sitting in a cave for most of it. She'd just be chilling in her cave and someone would show up and fill her in on everything she'd missed out on. It felt pretty lonely.

[Jen]

I liked it. My knowledge of norse mythology comes mostly from reading neil gaiman and the odd bits I’ve picked up in the ether so there was novelty in it for me and I found it to be an enjoyable story. I enjoyed this somewhat softer version of Loki, I found him amusing and kinda likable. It was a light read, good to fall asleep to the audiobook, and I agree I’m not sure it added anything or really nailed Ragnarok but as a character study/retelling/backstory of Angrboda and her children it worked for me.

[Bobby]

First of the groups BOTM selections that I have tried. Probably would not have read it otherwise, so that it helpful for me to have it suggested. I am not that familiar with Norse mythology so I read it more as a standalone book. The writing reminded me a little bit of C.S. Lewis in Chronicles of Narnia. Hard to explain. It was kind of quiet and simple. They spent a lot of time in a cave and then they spent a lot of time riding around in a cart. There was some action but a lot of what happened was described from a distance. You didn't see the witch blasting people with spells or people directly fighting with swords so this book was different from the swords and sorcery fantasy books that I typically read. Interesting to try it out.

[Bonnie]

I wish I liked this more than I did; for me it was only OK. I found myself leaving the book to go check websites or read news or to do crosswords, instead of reading. A few times I 'woke up' to realize I had read several pages without registering what I'd been reading, and had to go back.

My favorite character was Aggy's friend Skadi.
I started to trust Loki and was surprised by his betrayal, just as in Marvel movies! Speaking of Marvel movies, halfway through the book I realized that Hel showed up in the last Thor movie, Thor: Ragnarok -- that was Hela, Cate Blanchett's character.

[Bonnie]

Angrboda in her Ironwood cave recalled another book to mind, where a witch lived in a hut in the forest: The Broken Sword by Poul Anderson. We read it as a Buddy Read three years ago. I liked the writing very much -- very descriptive, vivid images, language that used... evoked... many senses.

https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

[Ian]

Poul Anderson presents another view of the Odin/Loki relationship in War of the Gods.

The story may surprise those familiar with Norse mythology mainly from the Poetic Edda, and the Prose Edda of Snorri Sturluson. It is instead drawn primarily from the early thirteenth-century Latin "Gesta Danorum" (Deeds of the Danes), by the Danish canon Saxo Grammaticus, who rationalized the old gods into human magicians.

There is an old, but usable, translation (by Oliver Elton) of this often-neglected source for Norse mythology, available free in Kindle, as The Danish History, Books I-IX. at https://www.amazon.com/Danish-History...

The modern translation by Peter Fisher exists in two forms: The History of the Danes, Books I-IX: I. English Text; II. Commentary, with a commentary by H. R. Ellis Davidson; and, revised, with a new edition of the Latin text, Gesta Danorum: The History of the Danes, part of a two-volume set of the complete work.

[Bonnie]

Susan wrote: "I have been a fan of Norse Mythology since I was a child and I would repeatedly check out Norse Gods and Giants by the D’Aulaires from the library..."

I adored their Book of Greek Myths with its vivid, gorgeous illustrations. I wish I had had access to the Norse book, so I would have learned those stories too as a child. I am going to read this now, and maybe give it to my nieces. Thanks for mentioning it!

D'Aulaires' Book of Norse Myths

[Ryan, Your favourite moderators favourite moderator]

So... Your thoughts about The Witch's Heart?

Am I alone in thinking Angrboda & Loki were never a great match and left baffled as to why she made him the father of her children?
Loki did a poor job of hiding his disgust at the appearance of his kids and generally came off as a bad parent, but did that the blatentness of that distract from Angrboda's failings of a mother? Personally I wasn't convinced that any of the key relationships in this story inspired the kind of loyalty that Ragnarok required to be triggered. With so little of Angrboda's story being present in the original myths there was plenty of room for artistic licence to convey personal bonds, but for the most part it came across as 'well of course she'd be upset about X, she's their mother'. With all that padding in Part One there's no justifiable excuse to my mind for such laziness.

There was so little reason to like much of the cast.

[Bonnie]

Anushree wrote: "This book could not stay either character centric or plot centric, and that made a mess."

Thinking more about this since I went back and looked over The Broken Sword.
Yes and that ties into what what Ryan said.
For me the language/ writing mattered too... with style like "Loki flopped onto the bed" I would want a good maybe post-modern story, but the characterizations were not deep or resonant.

With the modern style I did not feel I was in the world of myth, so at the end when I read about Fenmir being big enough to eat the sun or Jormungand being long enough to encircle the world, I could not believe it and muttered to myself, "It just is not possible to have a wolf or snake grow that big, even in a fantasy world" and could not really care about them.

[Leslie]

I had mixed feelings on this book. I did enjoy most of the story and seeing the POV of a character usually glossed over more in the Norse mythology. Angrbodr is both a strong and tragic character, and I did like the twist at the end with seeing the end/beginning through Hel's eyes. I did find some parts of it to be odd and a bit off-putting. I also found myself referencing D'Aulaire's Norse Mythology (I have a copy of the 1967 edition that I've had since I was kid) to remind myself of the connections and stories sometimes referenced in the book.
All in all, glad I read the book...

[Bonnie]

Alison, is the Gesta Danorum" (Deeds of the Danes) mentioned by @Ian the thing you mentioned on the Virtual Book Club call? It did start with a -G.

I stole @Anrushee's point: "This book could not stay either charater centric or plot centric"

( I don't mind at all if other people liked the book just fine though, in fact I am happy to hear it)

[Allison, Fairy Mod-mother]

The Gylfaginning is is the story of Thor and Loki running around causing mayhem.

[Bonnie]

Edda: Prologue & Gylfaginning

Gylfaginning

Sources of Norse Mythology: Poetic Edda, Voluspa, Lokasenna, Gesta Danorum, Gylfaginning, Prose Edda, Heimskringla, Volsunga Saga, Skirnismal

[Ryan, Your favourite moderators favourite moderator]

Gylfaginning means 'Drunken lads nights out' in English, I guess.

[Ian]

Bonnie wrote: "Edda: Prologue & Gylfaginning

This is a good list to start with, although it has overlaps (parts of books listed separately from their main titles). There is also an extended discussion (mainly by me) of sources for Norse Mythology, with links, in a parallel thread to this one, discussing Neil Gaiman's Norse Mythology.

See
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
and scroll down.

[Ryan, Your favourite moderators favourite moderator]

I have unsavory thoughts about how reading this book makes people want to learn more of Norse Mythology.

[Allison, Fairy Mod-mother]

Mythology is cool. Love mythology. Not only is it often ABSOLUTELY BONKERS, it says so much about a society. We are our stories in so many ways, and I love seeing what's important to different cultures.