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A review by fernforest
Goddess of the North by Georgina Kamsika
3.0
✨ 3.5
Sara is a Hindu goddess of order. Daughter to a goddess of chaos, their differences could not be more drastic. Unable to forgive her mother for events that transpired more than three thousand years ago, Sara left her true goddess form to live, more or less, as a human. Without believers to provide Sara with “god-juice”, Sara has limited powers. But she does maintain the ability to rewind time for a few moments. An interesting addition to the complexities of this book.
Sara has chosen to lead her human life as a Detective Investigator based in Sheffield. With her immortal memory, and the ability to sense when gods are meddling with the mortal world, Sara has positioned herself well to keep order in a world prone to chaos.
And with that, it’s time to step into the aether and hurl yourself into Sara’s complicated world.
Goddness of the North begins with an unusual earthquake, so centralized it appears to only rattle the grounds of a particular food market. A man dies during the earthquake, and at first glance it appears he died due to falling debris. But Sara was wandering the market when these events transpired, and this was no accident. It was a murder, marked with the unmistakable sign of gods meddling with mortals. But why? Well, hold on, because Sara is about to get to the bottom of it, and it’s a wild ride.
You know that 1939 phrase from the Wizard of Oz,"Lions and tigers and bears, oh my!", well Goddness of the North is just like that, except “Valkyries and Lokis and Gods, oh my!” Casting a wide net, Georgina Kamsika includes mythology and folklore from a variety of regions.
I thought that Kamsika did a wonderful job with all of the characters, bringing each of them to life. I loved that Kamsika did not shy away from including real world problems. It added an extra layer that made the characters more relatable and real. The food descriptions in this book deserve an honorable mention here because this book made me so hungry. There is a bit of a romance that blossoms in this book, though it is minor by comparison to the mystery at hand, it was a nice touch.
Unfortunately, there were a couple things I didn't like. Goddess of the North lost one star due to Sara being able to interfere with history with little to no consequence. Yikes. Half a star was lost for editing. By no means does it impact the wonderful story that Kamsika has written, but it did impact my reading experience. Stumbling across duplicate words, periods where a comma was clearly intended, misplaced apostrophes, etc. was quite distracting and I wish the editing had been stronger.
Overall, the pacing of this was just right, and the ending was satisfying in that it brought a majority of the loose ends together. Although Goddness of the North could easily be a standalone, I see the potential for a series.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with an ARC. I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.
Sara is a Hindu goddess of order. Daughter to a goddess of chaos, their differences could not be more drastic. Unable to forgive her mother for events that transpired more than three thousand years ago, Sara left her true goddess form to live, more or less, as a human. Without believers to provide Sara with “god-juice”, Sara has limited powers. But she does maintain the ability to rewind time for a few moments. An interesting addition to the complexities of this book.
Sara has chosen to lead her human life as a Detective Investigator based in Sheffield. With her immortal memory, and the ability to sense when gods are meddling with the mortal world, Sara has positioned herself well to keep order in a world prone to chaos.
And with that, it’s time to step into the aether and hurl yourself into Sara’s complicated world.
Goddness of the North begins with an unusual earthquake, so centralized it appears to only rattle the grounds of a particular food market. A man dies during the earthquake, and at first glance it appears he died due to falling debris. But Sara was wandering the market when these events transpired, and this was no accident. It was a murder, marked with the unmistakable sign of gods meddling with mortals. But why? Well, hold on, because Sara is about to get to the bottom of it, and it’s a wild ride.
You know that 1939 phrase from the Wizard of Oz,"Lions and tigers and bears, oh my!", well Goddness of the North is just like that, except “Valkyries and Lokis and Gods, oh my!” Casting a wide net, Georgina Kamsika includes mythology and folklore from a variety of regions.
I thought that Kamsika did a wonderful job with all of the characters, bringing each of them to life. I loved that Kamsika did not shy away from including real world problems. It added an extra layer that made the characters more relatable and real. The food descriptions in this book deserve an honorable mention here because this book made me so hungry. There is a bit of a romance that blossoms in this book, though it is minor by comparison to the mystery at hand, it was a nice touch.
Unfortunately, there were a couple things I didn't like. Goddess of the North lost one star due to Sara being able to interfere with history with little to no consequence. Yikes. Half a star was lost for editing. By no means does it impact the wonderful story that Kamsika has written, but it did impact my reading experience. Stumbling across duplicate words, periods where a comma was clearly intended, misplaced apostrophes, etc. was quite distracting and I wish the editing had been stronger.
Overall, the pacing of this was just right, and the ending was satisfying in that it brought a majority of the loose ends together. Although Goddness of the North could easily be a standalone, I see the potential for a series.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with an ARC. I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.