reviewTHURSDAY: Divine by Mistake

Divine by Mistake is a revised version of a novel first published as Goddess by Mistake. It is the story of Shannon Parker a teacher who is magically transported to a world full of mythical creatures. She takes the place of a warrior priestess of the Goddess Epona and soon finds herself in a traditional marriage to a sexy Shaman centaur. She must then rally her people to face an invasion by evil winged creatures who are seizing and impregnating human women.

As a huge centaur fan I was predisposed to like this book, which is clearly very popular with both romance and fantasy fans. Indeed, I found this book very easy to read and entertaining. Shannon is a personable protagonist and the action is fast-paced. I found the centaur characters appealing and the dialogue engaging. The interplay between secondary characters is well written and creates interest in reading more about this word and its denizens.

However I also found I simply couldn't comfortable from the point that mass abductions, rapes and murders are revealed that Shannon is still shown (in terms of where her thoughts and attentions are most often described as lying) as being largely preoccupied with making puns, habing sex, choosing accessories and taking an endless number of luxurious baths. It isn't that Shannon lacks empathy, some brief scenes are genuinely very moving, but the bulk of the prose tends to rest on flirting, bad jokes and wardrobe. The chick-litty first person and the tragedy of the events never gelled for me as a reader. I also considered the triumphant ending some what sudden and derivative and many of the plot points in the last third of the book cast the hero and heroine's judgement in very poor light (i.e. they did stupid things that got more peole killed than necessary, victory was more despite than because of these actions).

I certainly don't regret the time or money I invested in the book and I will try one of the author's other works with a heroine who is not from modern America and so might seem less blithe and preoccupied with narrating the events in pop culture dialect. Most readers will probably not have the same "issues" I do and so should probably give a writer with PC Cast's obvious talents the benefit of the doubt and try her work for themselves.