Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Goddess Girls: Athena the Brain (Book 1) by Joan Holub and Suzanne Williams

Rating 4 out 5 (for under 10 girls)
Rating 3 out 5 (for everyone else)
Reading Age: 8-10
Paperback: 176 pages
Publisher: Aladdin; Original edition (April 6, 2010)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 141698271X
ISBN-13: 978-1416982715

"Athena thought she was a regular human girl until she receives a letter from her father, Zeus the king of the gods (and principal of Mount Olympus Academy). Zeus requests that Athena come attend MOA and, hoping her eccentricities will fit in better with the other god boys and goddess girls than they do with mortals, she happily accepts. While at school, Athena quickly makes friends--and enemies--with the other god boys and goddess girls and learns how to adjust to life as a goddess."

This story is set in ancient Greece when the gods were children in school. This story follows Athena as she starts her life at the god school and adjusts to this world. I loved the characters, they were fun and  captured their essences really well.

The book is really well researched and the Greek mythology is woven into the stories and personalities. For instance Athena is brainy, Aphrodite is beautiful and obsessed with boys, and Pandora is obsessed with gossip. Their school personalities reflect their adult persona's. The story of Helen of Troy is also woven into this book in a fun and quirky way.

The story is a quick, and an easy light read (for an avid reader). I knocked it over in about an hour while sitting on the plane flying off to my Christmas holidays. It really is just a cute story that is fun and light.

My only quibble was the ending. It just seemed to stop with a few things left unresolved. I sat there flicking the last pages thinking “is that it?” But as this is a series of books (with each book following a different goddess) perhaps the stories flow into each other?

Young girls (roughly 8-10) will probably love this series and relate to it best. It is also a great introduction to the Greek Gods and Goddesses. If I get my hands on other books in the series I will definitely give it a read.

No comments:

Post a Comment