Mackenzi Lee

An instant New York Times best seller! *"This deft, nuanced examination of identity, destiny, and agency is a surprisingly tender addition to the Marvel canon."-Kirkus Reviews, starred review *"This mischievous origin story is sure to satisfy fans of this popular character."-Booklist, starred review This is the first of three young adult novels from New York Times best-selling author Mackenzi Lee that explores the untapped potential and duality of heroism of popular characters in the Marvel Universe. Before the days of going toe-to-toe with the Avengers, a younger Loki is desperate to prove himself heroic and capable, while it seems everyone around him suspects him of inevitable villainy and depravity . . . except for Amora. Asgard's resident sorceress-in-training feels like a kindred spirit-someone who values magic and knowledge, who might even see the best in him. But when Loki and Amora cause the destruction of one of Asgard's most prized possessions, Amora is banished to Earth, where her powers will slowly and excruciatingly fade to nothing. Without the only person who ever looked at his magic as a gift instead of a threat, Loki slips further into anguish and the shadow of his universally adored brother, Thor. When Asgardian magic is detected in relation to a string of mysterious murders on Earth, Odin sends Loki to investigate. As he descends upon nineteenth-century London, Loki embarks on a journey that leads him to more than just a murder suspect, putting him on a path to discover the source of his power-and who he's meant to be.

Where Mischief Lies

Loki

Tess Booden

When Loki and Amora cause the destruction of one of Asgard's most prized possessions, Amora is banished to Earth, where her powers will slowly and excruciatingly fade to nothing. She was the only person who ever looked at Loki's magic as a gift instead of a threat; without her, he slips further into anguish and the shadow of his universally adored brother, Thor. When Asgardian magic is detected in relation to a string of murders on Earth, Odin sends Loki to investigate. His journey in nineteenth-century London leads to more than just a murder suspect, it puts Loki on a path to discover the source of his power, and who he's meant to be.

Anna s

Natalie Baye

I'm not glad to say thay it was disappointing. But yet i give it 4 stars, why? Well, i enjoy it. A lot actually. (But it's more a 3.5 than a 4)

Loki is one of my favourites characters ever, so of couse i'm going to enjoy a book about him written by one of my favourite authors, but maybe my love for this character is what made me don't love this book. I found myself more interested in the supporting characters than in Loki himself, and i can assure you that this not happens when Loki is in the picture. He was off, in a way. I don't even know how to describe it, but for me it was not the Loki i expected.
On the contrary, i loved every single one of the supporting characters(Theo has my whole heart) (Amora too). The relationship between Odin and Loki was fantastic, in some parts it hit too close home. But yet, i can not shake this feeling that Loki was out of character in some parts of the book, but maybe is just that i have made this character my own and i can't see him in other way. Maybe i had too much expectations on this Loki and this story that i'm judging it too harsh.
Regardless of all that, is good, really good. At the end of the day it's Mckenzi Lee, so of course it's good. Definetly looking foward to the next ones.

Julia Moran 

2/5
So I feel like I had really huge expectations for this book and they were really crushed, to be honest, I had first given this book 4 stars but the more I think it over the madder I get and the more I realize I didn't truly love this book and I was being extremely generous because I love Loki and just didn't want to accept the fact that the book was so bad. It was entertaining and all that but I just knew the entire plot from the moment I started reading, it was pretty obvious that's how things were gonna evolve. Ngl Mackenzi disappointed me a lot, the characters feel pretty cookie-cuter and I feel like there's no character development throughout the whole book, I just think Loki is such a layered character with an extremely complex mind and Mackenzi didn't really know how to explore that properly and just stuck with some REALLY basic and simple problem. And also the ending just feels really half-assed like the deadline was approaching and she just had to wrap things up quickly; I truly did not like it, it just feels like a very convenient way to wrap thins up, it just left me feeling like the book had no reason to exist. It just doesn't feel like Loki to be all emo and boohoo humans think like this of me now I'm just gonna go ahead and prove them right >:( NOOOO I just think there's more behind why he does the things he does, not just because he read some shit in some book and daddy disapproves. OH, and it makes me very angry how this book is advertised as "LOKI FINALLY BEING HIS REAL QUEER SELF" and it's just not. Like I feel like Mackenzi just shoved 3 sentences talking about NOT showing (if it wasn't actually talked about so directly no one would've noticed) Loki's gender fluidness, a minuscule gay kiss and that was it. Like Nah 'mam, I'm sorry but you are not doing Loki right. 

Anyways... tomorrow drops the second episode of Loki so I truly hope that cheers me up!
LOKI SUPREMACY!!!!!

I love marvel but this just wasn’t for me. 

There was a few plot points I didn’t expect but honestly it was mostly predictable.

I did love Theo Bell as a character but that’s about it. 

Amora’s manipulative nature was not it, especially with half of the book building up to the main plot. It was frankly irrelevant in my opinion for the majority of the book.

I was mostly determined to read it all the way but once Loki was on Midgard I wanted to DNF it but I didn’t. The beginning chapters of Amora and Loki was the most enjoyable part and it only went downhill from there.

Best fanfiction I ever read. This book gave me butterflys. This Story was great.

Gwenifer

Nia E

LOKI - WHERE MISCHIEF LIES

“𝙷𝚎 𝚍𝚒𝚍 𝚗𝚘𝚝 𝚔𝚗𝚘𝚠 𝚠𝚑𝚊𝚝 𝚑𝚎 𝚠𝚊𝚗𝚝𝚎𝚍. 𝙷𝚎 𝚍𝚒𝚍 𝚗𝚘𝚝 𝚔𝚗𝚘𝚠 𝚠𝚑𝚘 𝚑𝚎 𝚠𝚊𝚜. 𝙴𝚟𝚎𝚛𝚢𝚘𝚗𝚎 𝚔𝚗𝚎𝚠 𝚋𝚞𝚝 𝚑𝚒𝚖.”

Mackenzi Lee’s young adult novel, Loki - Where Mischief Lies, explores the background story of one of Marvel’s villains: Loki Laufeyson. 

Before Loki becomes the somewhat villain we all grew to like, he spends his days trying to prove himself worthy to his father Odin and to later become king of Asgard, but fate has other plans for the young Asgardian. The novel takes us through different adventures and love stories and does a great job of explaining why Loki became the person he is. 

The book tells a story which is easy to follow, has remarkable humor and deals with important topics such as politics, sexuality and finding yourself. In my eyes it’s a great book with awesome characters plus Lee did a great job portraying the characters we all already knew - the royalties of Asgard. It really does feel like one is reading an mcu movie, which I absolutely hoped it would, so I’d say this book definitely lived up to my expectations.

Although the plot is very foreseeable and not that deep, I had a great time reading this and would definitely recommend this to any Marvel/ Loki fan out there.

4 out of 5 stars

Ashley Wendt

I enjoyed that more than I thought I would! I think Mackenzie Lee did a phenomenal job with Loki’s characterization and giving us all the things we love most about Loki and then some.

Demi

THIS WAS AN ABSOLUTE MASTERPIECE!!!!

To say I enjoyed this book is a total understatement. This book really blew me away. I definitely wasn’t expecting this to be as incredible as it was!

So I really loved the storyline of Loki. I think it was definitely interesting, and I really liked the pacing of the book and how the author layed out, and connected each scene together. While I did find some aspects of this to be a little predictable, it definitely didn’t take away from my overall enjoyment of this book.

As for the characters, I really enjoyed them. I loved getting to see Thor and Loki as kids/young adults. It was so fun to see there relationship grow and progress overtime, and I definitely enjoyed the banter and scarky remarks they had with eachother. As for Amora, well I didn’t like her at the start, and I didn’t like her at the end either, that’s all I’ll say about her. Her relationship with Loki however, I didn’t mind it at the start and I actually enjoyed that Amora was someone Loki felt connected to, so I’ll give her that. As for the characters on Midgard, I really enjoyed them! I think they were all interesting and complex characters with interesting backgrounds. I definitely liked Theo the best. His personality and remarks towards Loki really made me laugh, and I obviously LOVED the relationship Loki grew to have with Theo. I definitely enjoyed their scenes throughout the book.

Now Loki, I ABSOLUTELY LOVED HIM!!! Loki is one of my favorite characters in the Marvel universe, so getting to see the perspective of him growing up before he was labeled as “the Villain” was so interesting! I really loved seeing how he ended up as a villainous character and learning more about how he felt throughout his life as the “second” son and feeling cast out by Odin. It broke my heart to see Loki struggle so much and feeling like being the villian in the story was all he could be. I also really liked how Loki was portrayed in this. I found his character to be so hilarious, sarcastic, and witty, and I just absolutely loved that. I did also enjoy how the author explored the topics of sexuality and gender throughout this book. It was definitely a refreshing sub plot.

Overall, dare I say this is in my top 5 reads of 2019? I might have to!! I highly recommend this to anyone who loves the Marvel Universe, or to anyone wanting to read a coming of age/angst/hero to villian story!!!

Nicole Dykeman

4.5! As always, Mackenzi Lee does a fabulous job with everything she does. Literally one of my favorite authors at this point. From the Victorian London setting to the adorably lovable crew of Theo, Mrs. S, and Gem, there was so much to love in this book. 

This is definitely on the younger end of the YA spectrum—it gives off big teen angst and rebellion vibes. But it totally made sense for Loki’s character. He’s an emo boi through and through. 

I love the way that Mackenzi Lee writes characters who are queer without letting that be their entire identity. Loki is both a boy and a girl? Super chill. Possibly bisexual, but honestly who cares? Even chiller. Honestly, her queer character rep is always so. Good. And I will never get enough.

ryann

As someone who is a very big marvel fan this was a very enjoyable read especially with all the similarities in the way the characters act, to parallels from the MCU. (Not really a spoiler just my interpretation of events) Lee did an amazing job of capturing Loki’s attitude and character in every word spoken or thought. It was also another well written way of being able to see into the making of Loki and why his upbringing caused him to act how he did in the MCU and become notorious for what he is.

Nimet Akiturkmen

As a big Marvel fan and a Loki girl, I obviously had to get this one. I was really excited for this one, but unfortunately it was very disappointing🥲. The first third of the book had nothing to do w the plot, so it took a while to get to the actual story. Also, Loki was not like how I see Loki at all. He was rather weak in this book, more often tricked than being the trickster himself😕. He was insecure and wasn't confident about his magic at all, he was just simping for Amora (Enchantress) while she manipulated the hell out of him. Sad to say I didn't like this book.

mary

** spoiler alert **
           4,5⭐️
Mi è piaciuto davvero tanto.Loki è fantastico,come immaginavo e ho amato alla follia anche i personaggi “secondari” (non tutti,ovviamente).Non mi aspettavo questo finale e devo dire che mi ha leggermente delusa.Volevo altro,ma dovevo effettivamente avrei dovuto immaginare immaginare che tutto si sarebbe concluso così,but I am a clown,so.


INIZIO SPOILERS
Devo dire che ho adorato anche la trama di base,quindi la ricerca delle Pietre e Loki sulla Terra. 
Ho adorato Theo.Alla follia.Credo sia un personaggio davvero bello,dolce come pochi.
Parliamo,invece,di Amora.All’inizio era anche accettabile,mi piaceva tanto e cose così.Credevo che anche lei provasse dei sentimenti per Loki,anche se era praticamente quasi chiaro che non fosse così (ma continuavo a illudermi🤡).Dopo un po’ è diventata insostenibile.Dire che non la sopporto è poco,seriamente.Un personaggio odioso e soprattutto fastidioso.Dopo un po’ le sue continue manipolazioni mi hanno davvero stancata ed ero alquanto basita dal fatto che Loki non capisse.
La signora S,poi,divina.Molto carina,gentile e soprattutto coerente.La adoro.
Devo dire che era abbastanza scontato il fatto che fosse proprio Amora a causare tutti quegli omicidi e non ne sono stata neanche un po’ colpita quando è stato svelato,però tutto sommato non vedo in che altro modo potesse svolgersi la vicenda.
Ora,il finale.Volevo un Loki che potesse dimostrare fino in fondo di poter essere davvero buono. E soprattutto avrei voluto un Loki che si scrive da solo il proprio futuro e non che fa ciò che è già stato ingiustamente scritto. Purtroppo,però,volevo troppo.Fatto sta che è e sarà sempre un personaggio fantastico,che può dare tanto.

edit dopo più di un anno dalla lettura: btw loki è BI CANON it’s not that hard ???

I loved this book. Although I was hoping that there would be more Theo x Loki

Iris

Micol Scalabrino

Sei già il cattivo nelle storie di tutti, Loki» rispose lei, abbassandosi il velo sul viso. «Perché non inizi a interpretare la tua parte?

Mackenzi Lee esplora la mente, le difficoltà di una persona, le paure attraverso uno dei personaggi più controversi della storia dei supereroi: il Dio degli inganni. 

Loki ha paura, prova emozioni e forse è questo che mi ha permesso di legarmi tanto al suo personaggio, non ho mai avuto, infatti, l’opportunità di capire veramente perché lui è così. È proprio questa la premessa del libro: come mai Loki è così come lo conosciamo adesso, cosa lo ha portato a tradire la sua famiglia e qual è la sua storia. Il punto focale, ciò che mi ha stupito e preoccupato all’inizio, è che nella Londra in cui Loki si ritrova, un libro sulla mitologia norrena è già stato scritto. Quindi la domanda di fondo è proprio quanto il destino gioca nella storia di una persona, Loki infatti, non è ancora il dio degli inganni che conosciamo.

Non è stata una lettura facile e non a causa dello stile di scrittura dell’autrice, che è spigliato e mai noioso, ma per la storia che ha voluto raccontare, per le emozioni, per i desideri e per i conflitti che ci portano a certe scelte. E la domanda che ci si pone, che Loki si pone, è proprio se sia possibile cambiare il proprio destino o se si è costretti a percorrere una strada già scritta. Il libro percorre il viaggio di Loki alla ricerca di sé stesso, della sua identità e pone importanza a temi sempre più familiari: l’identità individuale e di genere, la difficoltà di esprimere sé stessi e anche la parità dei sessi che risulta molto diversa rispetto a quello che Loki conosce. Ci scontriamo contro i pregiudizi che ci accompagnano, purtroppo, ancora adesso ed è per questo che la lettura risulta veramente attuale.

Io mi sono immersa in questo libro, non ho potuto smettere di leggere fino all’ultima riga, che, lasciatemi dire, mi ha letteralmente spezzato il cuore. È sicuramente una lettura scorrevole e superficialmente semplice: lo si può leggere come fosse una storia e un mito, leggendo di un dio in mezzo ai mortali. C’è però tanto, molto di più. C’è complessità, debolezza, veniamo trasportati con il protagonista in una Londra del ‘900, con pregiudizi e difficoltà, combattiamo e proviamo sentimenti insieme a lui e tutto questo rende il libro profondo, attuale. 

Da amante di Loki da quando ne ho sentito parlare per la prima volta, non ho potuto che amare questo libro e ringrazio la OscarVault che ha portato questa meraviglia in Italia.

Gabriel Noel 

Great writing, wish it was gayer. Love gender fluid Loki, wish there was more Theo scenes.

lara van der paard

rafaela romanelli

An epic tale across the realms. A deadly power that spans millennia. A story of struggle and betrayal, this adventure is told through the patchwork past of Marvel's most misunderstood mischief-maker of all time: Loki: Trickster. God of Asgard. Brother. This is the first of three young adult novels from New York Times best-selling author Mackenzi Lee that explores the untapped potential of popular characters in the Marvel Universe. The novels focus on exploring the duality of heroism in specific character stories from the Marvel Universe.

Lavinia McDonald 

Quite boring, I had to force myself to read it however it was a great insight as to why Loki is the way he is 

Becca Futrell

tbh, I LOVE Loki & enjoyed this version of him — however, I was bored through a majority of this book :////

Claudia

Devo essere sincera, per questo libro avevo delle aspettative alte e ben precise, pensavo fosse un libro scherzoso e misterioso ma quando finalmente l'ho letto mi sono ritrovata fra le mani una storia che parlava di pregiudizi, di predestinazione e di temi che pur essendo in chiave ottocentesca da una parte e divina dall'altra non sono distanti da quelli con cui ci ritroviamo a combattere tutt'ora. È un libro leggero, si legge in poco e quasi non te ne rendi conto quando finisce, chiudi il libro e ti metti a pensare a come tu possa avere letto un romanzo così impegnativo e così leggero allo stesso tempo. Questa è la magia della letteratura, una magia che senza dubbio Meckenzi Lee sa usare. Vi consiglio assolutamente di leggere questo libro

An epic tale across the realms. A deadly power that spans millennia. A story of struggle and betrayal, this adventure is told through the patchwork past of Marvel's most misunderstood mischief-maker of all time: Loki: Trickster. God of Asgard. Brother.

Broken Hero (Marvel YA Novel)

Kireth Sandhu

Fast, fun read that includes significant moments but breezes through them in a way that makes it hard for me to care. In the context of the Marvel comics post War for the 9 realms, Loki is questioning who he is after becoming a hero and ruling Jotunheim alongside his brother Thor, King of Asgard. There's a lot of Avenger references, and we follow him generally avoiding his responsibilities and acting innocent whilst providing his snarky voiceover. The visuals were pretty decent, with a few odd drawings. Nightmare is also in this for some reason, and is dealt with in a pretty classical mythological-story style way, albeit modernised and Marvel-ised. There's also some major gods/ beings outside of time who are introduced to provide some meta-commentary alongside Loki, but it all doesn't really feel tied together in a satisfactory way - you can tell the writers were planting seeds for their unfortunately cancelled-after-one-run story.

Cristina Cicivelli 

Antecedente di un qualche decina d’anni alla sua prima apparizione sul grande schermo (nel “Thor” di Kenneth Branagh, interpretato da Tom Hiddleston), “Loki – Il Giovane Dio dell’Inganno” ha come protagonista una versione acerba dell’anti-eroe per eccellenza del mondo Marvel: è un giovane principe sicuro di sé e speranzoso di potersi guadagnare quel ruolo che è destinato a ereditare per diritto di nascita, nonostante i favoritismi del padre evidenti fin dai primi capitoli o il fatto che gli venga vietato di allenare il potere che gli scorre nelle vene, perché “nessuno voleva un mago come sovrano”. 

È lontano dal punto di rottura che in futuro lo spingerà a tentare di appropriarsi del trono con la forza (e con l’inganno), ancora disposto a tentare di sottostare ai limiti imposti da Odino e dall’etichetta di corte, che pesano su di lui come catene ai polsi e lo portano a guardare con ammirazione, e forse anche con un pizzico d’invidia, Amora: anche nota col nome “l’Incantatrice”, è l’allieva prediletta di Karnilla, maga di Odino, e fin da subito si mostra come una donna sensuale e irriverente, mai spaventata dalle conseguenze che potrebbe avere l’uso dei propri poteri senza supervisione, a corte o addirittura nel mezzo di un banchetto. 
 Amora non solo rappresenta la perfetta controparte del dio dell’Inganno, ma è anche l’unica amica del giovane Loki: il loro rapporto, i cui risvolti non sono mai scontati, è stato infatti in grado di mostrare chiaramente fino a che punto Loki sia disposto a mettersi in gioco quando viene coinvolto qualcuno a cui tiene.

È però nella seconda parte del libro che la storia entra nel vivo, quando (un po’ per punizione e un po’ per metterlo alla prova) Odino manda il figlio sulla Terra a indagare su una serie di omicidi che sembrano connessi a un’entità aliena. Nonostante un inizio a dir poco turbolento, Loki si trova costretto a collaborare con un’associazione segreta, la S.H.A.R.P., che in realtà è composta solamente da un variegato trio che va a dare una ventata d’aria fresca alla storia; risalta in particolare la figura del giovane Theo (a cui ammetto di essermi affezionata particolarmente, e a cui *almeno un pochino* ha iniziato a tenere anche lo stesso Loki), che ama leggere e ha una gamba malandata che lo costringe a camminare con l’aiuto di un bastone. Attraverso il legame che si instaura tra Theo e Loki, la Lee ci permette una riflessione su una Londra del XIX secolo che non solo appare sporca e inospitale, soprattutto agli occhi di un futuro principe di Asgard abituato ai palazzi dorati e a un cielo cristallino, ma è caratterizzata da una società dalla mentalità chiusa, in cui è possibile finire in prigione per chi si ama, perfetto opposto di quella asgardiana che non vede nulla di eccezione nel fatto che Loki sia genderfluid e si innamori di chiunque attiri il suo sguardo.

C’è una certa naturalezza nel modo in cui questo libro mostra quegli aspetti di Loki che non sono mai emersi davvero nel corso dei vari film, regalandoci un punto di vista originale su un personaggio così amato e permettendoci non solo di conoscere nuovi dettagli su di lui, ma di mostrarci come sarebbe potuto diventare se solo le scelte sbagliate e i pregiudizi non lo avessero spinto a essere visto come il cattivo della storia: è stato struggente osservare come, proprio per cercare di rimanere dalla parte dei buoni, si sia trovato a diventare ciò che tutti temevano e a sottostare alla previsione incerta di un futuro non ancora scritto.

Un’ultima nota di merito va fatta alla traduzione, che non risulta mai troppo rigida o superficiale, frutto della cura evidente che c’è dietro a questo progetto editoriale.
 Ringrazio ancora la Oscar Vault per avermi concesso una copia in anteprima.

Lisa Beasley

I enjoyed this a lot, I already knew I liked Mackenzi Lee's writing and I definitely like Loki as a character so I was pleased that the combination worked. The story wasn't the strongest but it was enjoyable and I liked getting an insight into the mind of a younger Loki. 

I am now very much looking forward to reading the Nebula and Gamora book Mackenzi Lee is writing.

Loki Where Mischief Lies

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