Mortal Gods (Goddess War, #2) by Kendare Blake

Disclaimer: I received this book for free from the publisher Macmillan USA in exchange for an honest review. However, this fact does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

Ares, God of War, is leading the other dying gods into battle. Which is just fine with Athena. She’s ready to wage a war of her own, and she’s never liked him anyway. If Athena is lucky, the winning gods will have their immortality restored. If not, at least she’ll have killed the bloody lot of them, and she and Hermes can die in peace.

Cassandra Weaver is a weapon of fate. The girl who kills gods. But all she wants is for the god she loved and lost to return to life. If she can’t have that, then the other gods will burn, starting with his murderer, Aphrodite.

The alliance between Cassandra and Athena is fragile. Cassandra suspects Athena lacks the will to truly kill her own family. And Athena fears that Cassandra’s hate will get them ALL killed.

The war takes them across the globe, searching for lost gods, old enemies, and Achilles, the greatest warrior the world has ever seen. As the struggle escalates, Athena and Cassandra must find a way to work together. Because if they can’t, fates far worse than death await.

Source: Goodreads

My review:

As you might remember, I am a total Kendare Blake fan because I really loved her books Anna Dressed in Blood, its sequel and Antigoddess as well. Thus, I was very excited for the sequel to Antigoddess, Mortal Gods, especially since the ending of Antigoddess was very dramatic and tragic.

And I am glad that I read the sequel, because it was a really great read. However, I did not love this book as much as I loved Antigoddess and the reason why I didn’t enjoy Mortal Gods so much is because it was slower than its predecessor. Antigoddess was full of action and I remember that I could hardly put it down, but Mortal Gods was unfortunately not as suspenseful.

But apart from that, I really enjoyed Kendare Blake’s writing style and the protagonists she created. They were all very complex, so different from each other and each of them had issues to deal with.

Cassandra was very angry in this sequel and she had troubles controlling her powers and her temper. And I must say that I didn’t like her as much as I liked her in the first book. I mean, I get it why she acted the way she did, but sometimes I was just tired of her whining and her mean behaviour (can’t say what was wrong with Cassandra or I would spoil book one for you). I really hope that she will change a little in the next book.

I had no problems with Athena, BUT I was hoping that her ‘relationship’ to Odysseus would be clarified in this sequel because I really wanted them to become a couple in the first book. And I was so looking forward to finding out if they would, but unfortunately, that didn’t happen. There was some drama between Athena and Odysseus, but I just couldn’t understand why Athena wouldn’t want to be with Odysseues, to be honest.

Speaking of characters – we were introduced to new ones and I really liked that because the new characters stirred up more drama and things got more complicated than they already were. Especially between Athena and Odysseus.

The antagonists were interesting too and I wanted to learn more about them. The Fates were more present in this sequel, but I still didn’t fully understand their role in this war between the Gods. I guess we will find out more in the next book.

The plot was okay, but I wished it had been more engaging. The ending was great though and it made up for the slower parts of the book. Now I am really curious to see what will happen next.

All in all I really enjoyed this sequel to Antigoddess despite its little flaws and I am definitely looking forward to the next book in order to get all my questions answered.

Rating: 

3.5 – 4 out of 5 stars

Note: I would like to thank Macmillan USA for sending me this review copy!

Andreea