Book Review: Great Goddesses by Nikita Gill

Title: Great Goddesses

Author: Nikita Gill

Rating: 3/5 stars

Release date: September 5th 2019

Publisher: Ebury Press

Goodreads Synopsis:

Empowering life lessons from myths and monsters.

Wonder at Medusa’s potent venom, Circe’s fierce sorcery and Athena rising up over Olympus, as Nikita Gill majestically explores the untold stories of the life bringers, warriors, creators, survivors and destroyers that shook the world – the great Greek Goddesses.

Vividly re-imagined and beautifully illustrated, step into an ancient world transformed by modern feminist magic.

‘I watch Girl become Goddess
and the metamorphosis is more
magnificent than anything
I have ever known.’

Review:

I loved Gill’s “Your Soul Is A River”, so when I got the chance to review her latest work, I was ecstatic!

Great Goddesses is centred around Feminism, womanhood, and the strength within all females that reflect the lives of each goddess mentioned in each poem. The book is absolutely beautiful in so many ways, with its words and messages, though I was not too blown away by it because I could not quite connect with the story and the goddesses mentioned. Perhaps it was due to my lack of Greek Mythology knowledge that created this strained connection? It didn’t matter too much to me though – I could still enjoy the stories. However, one thing I could not get used to was the fact that the book did not completely read like a poetry novel. There were several verses that were grouped together to sort of mimic a short story (or an anecdote, if you will). This had a huge effect on my reading experience, and I personally felt that they dragged on so much and made it difficult to read.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with longer-than-usual poetry verses. It was just personally a little hard for me to keep up with the length, given the sort of enigmatic writing (if that makes sense?!). I thought the words the author used were beautiful and fitting, but the flow of her tone and words felt very unconventional as you would only expect this equivocal type of writing in short verses.

This is just a personal opinion of mine. I don’t tend to reach our for poetry novels, so this could just be something that I’m not used to. I am a major fan of Gill’s gentle, yet thoughtful writing, but the short-story-esque parts of the book were just a chore to get through.. nonetheless, I appreciated the intricacy of how the lives of each Greek Goddess were explored to reflect the likes of humanity, roles of women in society, and the concept of change. It was a very interesting approach that delivered very powerful messages. Despite some problems I had with the structure of the book, I enjoyed a good handful of the poems in the book. If you are a fan of Greek Mythology with a feminist twist, this is the book for you!

A massive thank you to Penguin Australia for providing me with a free copy in exchange for an honest review!

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if you’re interested in buying Great Goddesses by Nikita Gill, you can click here to shop the book at Book Depository. I receive a small commission if you use the link! 🙂