Anyone who’s spent more than three minutes reading up on the Norse pantheon — or pretty much any polytheistic pantheon, really — knows it can get complicated in a hurry. So when I stumbled upon this Norse deity family tree from Veritable Hokum, I knew it would be a fun share here.
The Norse Pantheon Family Tree
Spoiler alert: Baldr dies.
Okay, seriously, there be spoilers ahead. Mythology nerds likely already know some of what goes down in The Songweaver’s Vow, but if you haven’t read it yet, I suggest you grab a copy and then come back for the background material. (Though to be perfectly fair, even knowing the base myth won’t give you a complete picture, so as long as you’re fully apprised of the spoiler-ific nature of this post….)
The Death of Baldr
So to start, we don’t know very much about Norse mythology.
Oh, sure, we have quite a lot of stories, and we’ve made them into quite a lot more stories. But we don’t really have a grasp of how old proto-Germanic religion functioned, how seriously people took these stories, and how these stories fit together.
The Songweaver’s Vow was a tough book to write, for a number of reasons. For one, this was the first time I was writing a story which wasn’t entirely mine and I had to follow a previously-defined plot, as the base story of The Songweaver’s Vow is a Greek legend. And Euthalia brought her Greek stories with her to Asgard, so this meant that I had two separate mythologies to blend while simultaneously trying to make the determined plot my own. It was like writing historical fiction which had to fit both our history and an alternate Earth history. Not gonna lie, it was a workout.
Norse Mythology: What We Know
I’ve loved kennings since I first learned what one was. My formal introduction, the first time I knew a kenning for what it was, was swan-road, a Norse kenning for the sea, and with that romantic imagery I was hooked.
A kenning is a figurative phrase to replace a more mundane noun, and they’re especially common and appreciated in older Norse and some Anglo-Saxon literature. To travel the swan road you would need a wave horse, or a ship. If you were telling Greek legends to entertain Norse gods, you might be a songweaver. /cough cough/
Basically, kennings are metaphors cranked to eleven.Kennings
You know it’s been a busy month when you have three book releases in two weeks.
Fortunately, two of those are anthologies. Covalent Bonds dropped on Valentine’s Day — because romance — and D is for Dinosaur hits the streets today — because dinosaurs.Release Day! The Songweaver’s Vow & D is for Dinosaur
If you’ve read Kitsune-Mochi, you might remember a scene where Murame hears footsteps trailing her down a mountain. That’s the beto-beto-san, named onomatopoeiatically for the beto-beto sound of walking in wooden geta on stone.The Beto-beto-san: the Japanese Youkai You Don’t See
If you like Celtic magic and myth, you might want to check out today’s guest cover.
Guest Cover Reveal: Halayda
When you’re working with two full mythologies, there are a lot of tidbits to include that just don’t get the screen time for full explanations. There are a lot of these “Easter eggs” hidden in The Songweaver’s Vow, and I’ll have a whole pile of them to share — in March. (Yes, in March, because some of them would be spoilerific, and we don’t need to revisit exactly how I feel about spoilers, do we, hmmm?)
But here’s a snack to hold you over.Background: Loki & the Gods’ Gifts
I’m so excited about this, you guys. I worked on this book for over a year, and it’s finally ready and it’s coming soon. And today I get to share the official cover reveal with you.
Ready? (Say yes, please, because I am.)Cover Reveal: The Songweaver’s Vow!
Here are some of my thoughts about getting started in indie publishing! Feel free to agree or disagree with me over there, fellow writers — comments welcome! http://rmfw.org/5-important-things-to-know-about-self-publishing-part-1-by-laura-vanarendonk-baugh/ and http://rmfw.org/5-important-things-to-know-about-self-publishing-part-2-by-laura-vanarendonk-baugh/ If you want to hear more from me about self-publishing, make sure you check out the August 2017… Things to Know About Self-Publishing
