Excerpt: Memoirs of a Trickster God

In the beginning, there was nothing, and no one. There was nothing because there was no one, seeing as how you need someone to talk about something for it to exist. Anyway, in that nothing, something was born. That something turned out to be my great-great-great-grandpappy, the grandpappy of all of the frost giants. This is when things became things, because once there is someone to notice them, they stop being nothing and start being something.
There were the fires of Muspell and the icy crags of Niflheim, and in the middle was the great and horrible Ginnungagap. From all this sprouted the first frost giant, Ymir. A great cow also came from all of the chaos, her name was Audumla and she formed the gods from the great salt lick. Out of the ice she licked Buri, who fathered the first gods, and from whom Odin is descended. But I wasn’t there, and so this is not the beginning for me, just a story the old guys tell around the camp fires at night when the drinking and feasting is done.
And who am I, one might ask? Why, I am the wonderful, lovable, huggable Loki. Although most people don’t see me as such. Play one little trick and the whole world hates you forever. Father one giant wolf and the whole world is against you. But that is another story for another time. We are talking about the beginning here, and the beginning of the world is quite a fascinating tale. Odin tells it differently, and he was there so he probably knows best, but I heard it differently growing up with the frost giants.