Book Review: Awakening Goddess by RN Gosser

Title: Awakening Goddess
Series: Guardians of Terra
Author: RN Gosser
Genre: Dark Fantasy; Mythology; Romance
Publication Date: January 14th, 2022

The Guardians of Terra is the only thing standing in the way of humanity being annihilated.

After Mya’s life is threatened by a vicious demon sent to kill her, she is brought into the Guardians of Terra, a group of gods pledged to protect Earth from the vengeful gods of old. The Guardians also inform her that she is a goddess herself, which she doubts with every fiber of her being.

Lir, an intense and arrogant god of the sea, leads the group of misfits with a deeply intimidating and explosive nature. But his protectiveness over Mya may end up losing the war for them entirely. Lir is both compelling and impenetrable and the sassy Mya is having a hard time figuring him out.

Through magic, prophecies, and a little bit of godly help from her friends and not-quite-enemies, Mya realizes that she may be far more powerful than she thought. But is it enough to challenge the ever-growing armies of supernatural beings, undead, and vindictive gods on the other side of the war…?

A seductive, freeing, and compelling story about the family you choose, inner power, and healing.

 

Rating

*A Thank you to the author for allowing me to read this. This is my honest and unbiased review*

 

Hello Fellow Reader,

 

First things first, Gosser has an amazing world that she's built. It's obvious that she has done her research on the mythology surrounding the gods that she uses in this book. Their characterizations and motivations all make sense and are in character with the mythology surrounding them. 

Also, Gosser's action and fight scenes are done very well. Typically, fight scenes can bore me when they are not done properly. Sometimes the author will say there is one and then completely gloss over it, or they just seem too outlandish and one sided. Gosser's scenes were interesting and even fun at times. I liked the main gods, they were unique while still having the characteristics they are known for. My favorite character was Jari, The Goddess of snakes, and I enjoyed reading her POV sections in the book. 

I do like that their are different POVs in this book, and there was never a time I was confused about whose POV I was reading or lose track of what any one character did. There is a downside to this however, and that was that because some characters were more interesting, it made going back to Mya's POV a bit harder, as comparably she wasn't as interesting. 

There was also a surprising amount of humor in this book, which took me off guard as I did not expect it in a Dark Fantasy. There were moments that I appreciated the humor and laughed but there were also some moments where the sudden comedy broke my immersion and it did take me a little while to get back into it. I did genuinely like the plot and now that Mya finally has her Goddess powers, I'm very interested to see where Gosser takes things.

Overall, a very interesting Dark Fantasy.