My Undying Love for Appendices

Three of my favorite books have appendices, these books being The Lord of the Rings, Dune, and Mistborn. When reading these books, I remember flipping through to the back to look at the appendix. I feel that the appendix enriches my experience of the book. Of course, it is hard to put into words exactly why I love appendices; I’ll try to give a list of reasons:

Reference:

One particularly useful thing about the Mistborn appendices was its use as a reference. For those of you who haven’t read Mistborn, it is a fantasy with an interesting magic system based on imbibing different metals. At the end of the book is something called the Ars Arcanum which is a list of the different magical metals and their uses. I went back to the section, wanting to check something or to see how a new revelation fit with what was already provided. This was fun and exciting, allowing me to stay up to date with and immersed in the story.

Funnily enough, immersion is the next topic.

Immersion:

Of course, a story should be able to stand on its own without an appendix. It should already be immersive. However, having an appendix with extra knowledge can be useful and rewarding for dedicated readers. If you enjoyed reading the Lord of the Rings, then turning to the appendix and learning about the hobbits’ creation of pipeweed or looking at real elvish runes can add more depth to your experience. These things help you better visualize the work and meet it on its own terms. These things enhance the experience given to the reader.

Cool stuff:

Writers, and world builders especially, won’t be able to include every interesting thing they’ve written in their book. Including tidbits of information and lore in the appendix can be a way to showcase cool things that the author has worked on, but that didn’t make it into the book. This can also be used to give hints and secrets about other books in a series, showcasing some of the more interesting aspects. In the Lord of the Rings appendix, there is a timeline of events in middle earth. Eventually, in the Silmarillion, we would see many of those events fleshed out and given more detail.