Antigoddess

by Kendare Blake

Grade: 2 1/2 stars
Story summary: The gods are slowly dying--whether succumbing to a feral madness, being eaten alive from the inside, or having being choked by sprouting owl feathers, they are every one of them facing imminent death. But in one little town in America, there lives a girl who is a reincarnation of the prophetess Cassandra, who may just be the key to saving Athena, Hermes, and the other gods.

Thoughts: It wasn't actually that bad. I enjoyed it, and would recommend it to fans of Greek mythology. Odysseus, Hermes, and Athena played some of the most major roles, and they are among my favourite characters from the Greek mythos. Also the creepiness factor was pretty awesome--Athena's feathers especially, and Poseidon's madness. And spoiler (translate): Oynxr unq gur thgf gb xvyy dhvgr n srj punenpgref, juvpu V yvxrq.

But, it was also very...teenager-y. All the important characters were teenagers, and there was a fair bit of teenage angst. Not that there's anything wrong with teenagers, of course, but I would have preferred a better impression that these beings were actually thousands of years old. Also, Odysseus is definitely my favourite Greek hero, but his cleverness wasn't actually shown here, just talked about a lot. True, the descriptions of his cleverness could be rather cool, but all he actually really did was follow Athena around and admire her.

I think I was mostly disappointed because Kendare Blake's other book, Anna Dressed in Blood was so cool, so I immediately bought this one in hardcover when it was available, and it wasn't quite worth it.