Title: Hera Queen of Gods
Author: T.D. Thomas
Publisher: Self Published
Publication Date: Oct 2012
Classification: YA Novel

Summary from Goodreads:

Hera couldn’t care less what the other gods think, even when it’s about her. And it often is. Frankly, Hera couldn’t care less about anything, except doing her duty as queen – protecting order and defending the mortal world against any threats. But when the Fates go missing, Hera and a handful of other gods must temporarily become mortal to search the human world for the missing goddesses.

Hera finds that mortality begins to change her. It’s not just the loss of her divine powers. She expected that. It’s deeper somehow. It’s affecting how she thinks, how she feels, what’s important to her. And it gets much worse after she meets Justin, who defies every prejudice she once had
about mortals. At the worst possible time, and despite all her efforts, Hera’s black-and-white world starts to unravel.

Torn between who she’s becoming and who she needs to be in order to fulfill her duty, Hera must survive a horde of murderous creatures sent to exploit her new weakness. In the end, only Hera can stop a traitorous plot conceived by a secret alliance of ancient and new enemies, a plot that threatens to destroy not only the order Hera is sworn to protect, but all of existence itself.

My Thoughts:

So one of my obsessions in the book world is books that have characters who are gods or goddesses. Basically any book that has mythology or the greek or roman gods or goddesses is a book I’m going to jump at the chance to read. So when the author asked me if I wanted to read Hera’s story I jumped at the chance, I love seeing how authors add new twists and turns to old tales on the Heavens and the rulers that live there.

The big thing that any reader is going to notice when they read this book is the fact that the characters jump right out at you. Each god or goddess had to come down from the Heavens and inhabit the body of a mortal teenager, they could only bring one power with them to Earth, their mission is to rescue the Fates.  There is Hera, obviously the Queen of Gods, who is a stubborn, determined, and decisive character. Zeus is in the body of the resident jock and he has his super strength along with his higher than thou attitude. Athena holds Zeus in the palm of her hand and she is the one in the group who helps to bring all plans about with her wisdom. Hermes is the average looking teenage boy who can turn invisible and is a valued fighter in their group for his quickness. Apollo is there for his healing nature and for the fact that his twin sister Artemis will not leave Hera’s side, she is Hera’s body guard and can morph into any animal. Lastly, there is Hera’s sister, Demeter who can control plants and is there to support her queen sister. Well that is all the gods but there are also mortals who enter the picture and the one who stays the longest is Justin, a mortal who has extreme power even though he doesn’t know it yet. I have to say out of the whole group I loved them all but Justin and Hera shine because they are the main characters.

The big thing that I loved beside the whole cast of characters is how awesome this book was written. I love YA books but I almost feel it would cheapen this book to just call it a YA book. I feel it was a little more like a New Adult book for the fact that several of the themes and thoughts of the gods just seemed so large and in charge. So I loved the mix of the real problems that the gods and goddesses were dealing with. Each one of them is an extremely powerful person where they come from but on Earth they have to learn how to handle themselves in a more mortal way which brings them some clarity and strength. The characters seem themselves as indestructible but they have a lot to learn and being on the mortal world once again will teach them more about humanity and a strong emotion called love that none of them expected. I really loved how Hera had to learn who to be in this book, her live has span thousands of years but she never really learned the value of herself and her love, living her life for who she wants to be. She has huge responsibility up in the Heavens and on Earth she doesn’t feel like she can let her guard down but with the help of Justin and the other gods, like Hermes, stepping up, Hera just might learn who she can and can not be for her own reasons, not those forced upon her by others need for her to be strong.

Overall, I loved the mix of awesome characters, the strong plot lines, and the important messages there were to learn. The only complaint I have that keeps this from being full 5 hearts is the fact that the storyline did repeat a few times. There were a few battles or spells that were cast that seemed to be repeated in an easier fashion later on in the book, making you say “why couldn’t they have done it the easy way from the get go!” However, I can’t wait for more of this story, I’m hooked and I have to give props to this new indie author that will certainly have me waiting for the day these books are sitting on the shelves of bookstores for every teen to gobble up.