The Goddess Test (Goddess Test, #1)

by Aimée Carter

It's always been just Kate and her mom—and her mother is dying. Her last wish? To move back to her childhood home.

So Kate's going to start at a new school with no friends, no other family and the fear her mother won't live past the fall. Then she meets Henry. Dark. Tortured. And mesmerizing. He claims to be Hades, god of the Underworld—and if she accepts his bargain, he'll keep her mother alive while Kate tries to pass seven tests. Kate is sure he's crazy—until she sees him bring a girl back from the dead. Now saving her mother seems crazily possible. If she succeeds, she'll become Henry's future bride, and a goddess.

• ISBN13: 9781848450400
• Publish Date: 1 October 2011 (first published 1 January 2011)
• Publish Status: Out of Print
• Out of Print: 7 June 2013
• Publish Country: GB
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
• Imprint: Mira Ink
• Format: Paperback
• Pages: 304
• Language: English
• URL: http://harpercollins.co.uk

Reviews

[Leah]

This was such an interesting read. I don’t know a lot about the Greek myths but I enjoyed this nevertheless. I liked Kate and I loved the idea of the tests, although I wish we had seen more of the actual tests instead of them being a secret. I’m excited to read the other two books, and seeing what happens next with Kate and Henry.

[anne]

Lightweight, but clever use of mythology. Very soap opera ish.

[stefu1]

Ok even though they are apparently mythological mistakes (I actually don't care about that tbh, it shouldn't have been really accurate b/c then it wouldn't have been as good/ not really creative on the authors part, so I think she did that on purpose). Any who, I really liked it. BUT the thing that prevented its 5th star was its (show spoiler)[ overuse of the it's-my-fault game (please just shut up and suck it up) ] (hide spoiler) but all in all a success.

[cornerfolds]

Cornerfolds.com

The Goddess Test has been on my radar for a really long while now. For whatever reason I just took my sweet time getting around to it. But now I've read it and... I'm torn. I am a big proponent of Greek mythology - hell, I'm a Classics minor. I am totally, 100% cool with an author changing around the gods a little. One of my favorite series of all time is the Dark Hunter series by Sherrilyn Kenyon! But Aimée Carter really did a number on these guys. She makes them totally... good. Like, way too moral to fit into the realm of Greek mythology at all...

Gluttony: Dionysus
Lust: Every god except Artemis, Athena, and Hestia
Wrath: Ares/Athena/Poseidon (to name a few)
Sloth: Dionysus/(possibly) Apollo
Pride: Aphrodite/Zeus
Envy: Hera/Hades/Aphrodite
Greed: Hades/Poseidon

I'm just saying. Has this woman ever read ANY Greek myth? There's only so much change an author can get away with in my opinion and Aimée has crossed the line.

Okay, so now that I've gotten the big god changes out of the way, let's talk about our protagonist. Kate Winters is the girl who is chosen for the tests. For whatever reason, Henry (Hades - what is with all the changed names, by the way?) thinks she's totally perfect. I think she's totally slow. Like, sloooooow. There were so many times that I was literally rolling my eyes and huffing and puffing because I was so exasperated with how amazingly SLOW she is to get anything! For example, once she's been told that Henry is Hades and he's done a million things to prove it to her, she's still like, "I dunno..." I mean, seriously? And then when Henry gave her the little clue to the tests and she wanted to sit there and argue with him about it and he literally had to spell it out for her! I mean, come on! Honestly though, she isn't the only one who's slow in this book. Henry has had literally decades to figure out who the "bad guy" is and he has a pretty huge clue to point directly at that person. He's a god. And he couldn't figure this out. Is this really who we want ruling the underworld (he calls it "hell" at one point, by the way)? But I digress.

More than being slow, Kate is kind of a bitch. I'm also pretty sure she's twelve. They talk about sex quite a bit in this book but they -never- call it "sex." They call it (I kid you not) "that." Over and over. "Not 'that...'" or "Are you going to do 'that'?" Can we please act like adults? You're 18 years old. This brings me to my (other) biggest complaint about The Goddess Test - the way they handle the "issue" of sex.

For whatever reason, the author of this book decided to treat sex as something dirty, wrong, and (quite literally) sinful. Kate's best friend (also a really weird topic), Ava, does "that" with a guy who she's known for literally six months. Because of *gasp* jealousy between men, something terrible happens to said guy. And who does Kate blame? The guys who acted like morons, surely. Um... no. Kate goes postal on Ava - like, full-on psychotic - literally calling her a slut and telling her everything is her fault for being easy. She forbids Ava from ever coming near her again lest Ava's slutty ways rub off on her. While I'm utterly appalled at Kate's behavior, everyone else proceeds to pat her on the freaking back and let her know her judgment was fair. Um... excuse me?! So because Ava had sex with some guy (and let's not forget, Ava is 18 years old - she is an adult and has known this guy for quite a while. Even if she'd just met him the night before, however, SHE IS AN ADULT AND CAN SLEEP WITH WHOEVER SHE WANTS TO!) she is the worst of people, everything is her fault, and she can never look in Kate's direction again. The amount of slut shaming (for lack of a better term) in this book is unreal. This obviously carries over to Kate's storyline, but I won't even get into that.

Let's go back to the Greek gods for just a minute. Who's familiar with the story of Leda and the Swan? Anyone? Go read it... Finished? Okay. Now, please tell me again how lust is totally not something the Greek gods are cool with. Aimée Carter should probably stay away from mythology. Forever.

The only redeeming quality of this book is that the story was actually interesting. I did like the original concept of the search for a new goddess. I was listening to the book on my iPhone and I did get through it fairly quickly. I enjoyed the romance between Kate and Henry even if it seemed to happen suddenly - something I've attributed to the fact that months at a time are skipped. I also kind of enjoyed the relationship between Kate and her mom. Because of these things, I'm actually going to go with a slightly higher rating. Just be prepared to be enraged if you are a woman of the 21st century who doesn't believe sleeping with a guy you've been seeing for six months makes you a slut. I might listen to the next book just because I already own it, but I'm undecided at the moment.


Notes on the Audiobook
Brittany Pressley is a much better voice actor than the last woman I encountered. I really have no complaints.

[Katie King]

**1 star**

I love Greek mythology. I try to absorb everything I find that mentions it, even in part. I've read countless books, watched all the movies involving it, and played Age of Mythology. So when I first heard about this book, I was pretty excited. A retelling of the myth of Persephone, but with a twist - she has to face a few tests in order to get the crown. 30 pages into this book, I wasn't excited anymore.

The problem is, Kate is your typical useless heroine. She cries a lot and whines a lot, but doesn't actually do a whole lot. What she is good at is delegating responsibility to other people. And crying. She's good at crying. At the end when the council decides whether or not she has passed all seven tests, I seriously just wanted to punch her in the face. I get her arguing with Zeus if she had been a strong, rebellious character this whole time, but nope. She's just annoying. Speaking of the results of the seven tests, what a cop out. All these tests happened unknowingly to the reader and to Kate. Kate just bopped around the whole book whining while passing all the super hard magical tests.

The romance? Wherein Kate is really resistant to accept the contract because she'll be Henry's "wife" six months a year, but it'll keep her mom alive longer so she agrees? Where there is actually little mention of Henry's sexiness/hotness until 200 pages in when Kate suddenly decides she loves that poor, sexy, tortured soul? A soul that's a powerful, ancient, virginal god of death. Don't worry, Kate takes care of that (with a little help from an aphrodisiac). But the whole book is just Henry brooding and trying to find a balance between giving her space and enjoying her company, and Kate is just like "I'm just doing this for my mom- WOW HE'S HOT!"

I think that yeah, while Hades as a sensitive virgin was a bad creative choice, I think he is a more realistic character than Kate. He struggles with his love for Persephone, and when he develops feelings for Kate he accepts she may never love him and keeps it under control until she reciprocates. Kate meantime is busy thinking about her mom -- not really, she just revels in her dream world mom and forgets about the real one with cancer, dying a few miles away.

The sad part is that I only need to focus on Kate, Henry, and the romance in this review because that's central to the plot. Nobody else in the book really matters, not even the person that's been killing off all the other girls. Some characters were only good for slut-shaming (Ava), and some were only good for angry overreactions (James). But what did I like about this book? I liked the idea...and that's about it. I stared at that sentence for a long time and I have absolutely nothing to add to it.
 
Summary:
Persephone retelling gone bad. Limp noodle heroine and shy, virginal god of the Underworld unite as one bowl of abstinent pasta. Stay away.

[Angie]

For a book titled The Goddess Test, there isn't very much testing going on. Kate is moving to her mother's hometown, where she wishes the spend her last months. All Kate has done for the past four years was take care of her mother as she went through rounds and rounds of chemo. Now, she's starting over in a new town, finally making friends. Or so she thinks. Her new friend Ava invites her to a party, but really tries to leave her out in the woods, but when Ava accidentally drowns, Kate meets Henry. He's able to bring Ava back, but only if Kate promises to stay with him for six months. She thinks he's crazy, but he's not.

The Goddess Test actually surprised me. I had seen mixed ratings for it, but I was still interested. I do have to admit that I found a lot of it quite silly, but I enjoyed it nonetheless. I thought it was a fun, quick read. Nothing remarkable, just a nice afternoon of reading. I can't pinpoint what exactly I liked about it. I just liked it for some reason. However, its faults are many.

My first problem with the The Goddess Test was how easily Kate accepted the weirdness around her. When Ava leaves her in the woods and then swan dives into the river, that's pretty strange. Who does that?! Kate doesn't think anything of that, just starts freaking out when Ava starts bleeding from her head. Then she doesn't question her being 100% fine after Henry arrives. I would be shocked out of my mind! And even though she doesn't fully believe that it happened, she quickly makes the decision to stay with him because he can keep her mom alive. Really?

My second issue was Kate's tests. We don't actually see them happening, but what they are is revealed at the end. The seven deadly sins? Seriously? The Greek gods want to make sure she's a sweet, innocent being before allowing her to be one of them. Since when do the gods care about these things? In fact, they're known for committing all of the sins! Unless over the millennia, they've all had severe personality changes, or the author just completely rewrote them altogether. This was all really laughable, and I couldn't help but think things would have been more interesting if her tests were the opposite! Sinning!

I don't know what it is, but despite my complaints, I liked The Goddess Test. I thought the romance was sweetly developed, and the whole thing just made me feel good. I also liked how it felt like a complete, contained story. I'm satisfied with that ending, but I was still curious as to what comes next for Kate and Henry.

Read more of my reviews at Pinkindle Reads & Reviews.

[Kim Deister]

I have always loved Greek mythology and I love retellings and reimaginings of fairy tales and legends. I got both in The Goddess Test, which makes me a very happy reader!

The characters in this story were wonderful! I love that Kate is created to be strong and independent, her own person. She has had to be strong not only for herself, but for her mother, too, who is slowly dying from cancer. It has always been Kate and her mother against the world and the thought of her inevitable future without her mother terrifies her. Henry, too, has his own story of suffering. He has been badly burned in love, tortured to the point that he sees no true future for himself. His immortality and the thought of a lifetime of feeling lost is overwhelming to him. His transformation is one of the shining points in the book, watching his character change and grow. Kate also meets James in her new high school, whom I loved. He was funny, open, sincere... just the kind of guy I would be attracted to! Kate also meets Ava, the typical high school Mean Girl who takes an instant dislike to Kate. Ava figures prominently in this book (in ways I can't reveal!) but she was one of my favorite characters throughout the book.

The Goddess Test tells the story of Kate and Henry and Kate's quest to pass the Tests. But there is much more to it. It is also the story of loss, love, and acceptance. The story line between mother and daughter was extremely emotional and, although it was bittersweet, it was one of my favorite parts of the book.

I loved the premise of this book, the Tests. In most mythology, the questing hero is male. So it was refreshing to have our questor be female. She accepts Henry's deal, knowing that no one has ever passed all seven tests. But for Kate, it is worth trying just for a chance at a little more time with her mother.

There are a lot of twists and turns with these tests, coming in unexpected ways and places. There are a number of clues throughout the book about the gods and goddesses, as well as the nature of the twists. Some of them are easy to identify, while others keep you guessing until the end!

Purists might not enjoy some of the changes to the traditional stories and representations of Greek mythology. But these kinds of changes are appropriate to the story, not to mention the YA demographic. And those kinds of changes are exactly why I love retellings/reimaginings... fresh, new looks at established characters and stories. I felt that, while some things have changed, the essence of who these gods and goddesses were in traditional mythology was maintained.

Some Quotastic Goodness

--Keep trying until you have no more chances left.
--Sometimes we misjudge what is possible and what is not.
--Whatever obstacles you face, remember you can get through anything if you want to badly enough.
--No matter what happens, I will always be there for you, even if you do not remember who I am.
--But if this works-if I pass, I need to know that when you look at me, you're going to see me, not just her replacement. That there is more in this future for me than standing in the shadows while you wallow the rest of your existence away.
--The afterlife is whatever a soul wishes or believes it to be.

My Recommendation: I truly enjoyed this book! I love that the romance in it was one of mutual respect and not overly swoony, gushy love. The retelling/reimagining of traditional mythology was fantastic! I highly recommend this read for lovers of retellings and of Greek mythology!

*This review originally appeared at my blog, http://thecaffeinateddivareads.multifacetedmama.com/?p=8722.

[Kelly]

http://www.divabooknerd.com/2013/10/the-goddess-test-by-aimee-carter.html
I loved The Goddess Test. It was unique and really engaging. All too often young adult mythology consists of long descriptive passages and delves further into the myth than necessary, but Aimee Carter creates a world in which readers can lose themselves. The characters are likable, especially troubled soul Henry. The deal created between Kate and Henry felt awkward and understandably, Kate just accepted without any fuss or fanfare, to save a girl she had only just met. It isn't until the story moves forward, that her motives are justified, but she's far too accepting and seemingly naive for a girl who's eighteen.

If you can move past Kate's lack of curiosity, it really is entertaining. A few plot twists that I certainly didn't see coming, will keep readers on their toes. I'll definitely be continuing on with the series, to see what becomes of Kate and Henry.

[Chelsea]

I loved this book! I mostly just love Greek mythology but adding it to a sweet book makes it so much better! I found a lot of low reviews for this one so I was a like nervous reading it. As I’ve already said I ended up loving it. A lot of people were upset because it didn’t follow Greek mythology perfectly but that’s the point isn’t it? It’s a fictional book! It’s not supposed to follow the myths exactly. I like that it was a cool twist on the myths and the Gods.

I loved all the characters. Even the not so nice ones. They all just had so much personality and you saw a lot of them all when they interacted with the main character. Kate wasn’t too bad either. I liked her during the whole book and she was a good heroine. I can’t wait to read the next ones!

[jeannamichel]

Kate’s mother is on the brink of death and Kate does everything in her power to make her comfortable. That includes, of course, moving to the small town where her mother grew up to make her feel more at home. Kate enrolls into the school there, which she discovers is filled with all sorts of characters. As a new-kid prank, Ava brings her to the edge of a scary mansion’s property but the prank is no longer funny when people are getting hurt. Henry, the owner of the mansion, strikes up a deal with Kate. But Kate does not fully understand what she just signed up to do. The Goddess Test takes Greek myths to a new level, mixes them up, and gives the readers an awesome recipe of entertainment.

This book was fantastic! I am not one of those people who love Greek mythology, but I respect it. I read Percy Jackson and loved Disney’s Hercules movie. I’m taking a class next semester about Greek myths. I do not love the myths, but I find them interesting. When I heard that this book had aspects of Greek mythology in it, I was hesitant because there are so many “fanfictions” out there devoted to myths and I thought this probably is one of them. I was dead wrong. The Goddess Test takes you on a wild ride of matchmaking: what Hades needs to do to find a wife. This is a fresh taste of any myth I have ever heard of. And, as a reader, you do not even need the slightest familiarity with Greek myths because Carter describes this new story in a way that explains the myths perfectly.

At first, I didn’t really like the cover. It is weird looking. The position of the model looks forced and not very comfortable. But the cover grew on me. I find myself liking it now, for a reason I don’t know yet. I keep looking at the cover and wondering, whoa, is that Megan Fox? I don’t think it is, but if you stare at the cover long enough, see if you can’t see the similarity in the model’s face. After looking at the series as a whole (yes, this book is the first in a series), with all their covers, I like how each cover stands out but each still has individuality.

There was a huge cast in The Goddess Test. I loved getting to know each one, wondering what Greek god or goddess this one was (SPOILER: there is a key in the back, telling you Carter’s characters next to the name of the Greek god or goddess). My favorite of all the characters has to be Henry. That sounds so cliché of me, liking the male lead but Henry was the most drawn. This boy had secrets and this unnamable depth that you’ll just have to read the book to know what I am talking about. Henry’s depth got me guessing every time he would answer one of Kate’s questions. The way his eyes glimmered on Christmas. He was the reason I wanted to know more, immersing myself into the book to fully understand what Kate was getting herself into. Carter created all her characters with an individuality that set them apart from the others. It was the truly remarkable cast that will have me coming back for more.

Carter brings you into an original world that holds you there until the last page. Her writing was amazing, but the plot lacked an ongoing element. The plot was slow, at times. In the beginning it didn’t pick up until the reader goes to Ava’s “party.” Still, it had tons of moments that had you on your toes. What made me push through the slowness of the plot was Carter’s writing. She blew me away with description and I loved her voice that seeped through the plot and characters.

The Goddess Test is for readers who love Greek mythology, for readers who want a summer read that will leave you wanting more (the second one in the series is already released, Goddess Interrupted). If you haven’t read this one yet, go put it on your list because with Carter’s magnificent writing, Henry’s secrets, and the unique myths will not leave you disappointed.