CBR 14 Bingo: Rec’d
Katee Robert is probably not an author I would have gotten into without all the hearty recommendations of her that I have read!
Helen Kasios wants to be more than a pawn, and competing in the trials to become Ares seems to be her way out. But her family has other plans for her, and her brother offers her hand in marriage to whoever wins.
Of course, I love Katee Robert’s books, and I really enjoy her more plot-heavy Olympus books. This one probably had the most plot of them all, as well as a lead who steals the show.
I adored Helen. I’m ambivalent on her in a lot of Greek mythology retellings – she is too easily given short shrift – but here she is put front and center as a beautiful person who knows exactly how powerless people want and expect her to be, and a person who wants to be more. I enjoyed the complexity of her character and situation.
I also really liked the way Helen, Achilles, and Patroclus’s relationships worked, the individuated dynamics of each pairing within the triad, and how they all came together as a solid unit. Despite Achilles and Patroclus having a long history together, Helen fits in well without taking over.
I did wish, though, that we got to see more of the three of them together in less intensive situations. They are in the pressure cooker atmosphere of the compound for most of the book, so we don’t get to see them relax around each other as much as we did the couples in the previous books. But that’s a minor quibble.
And now I must wait for the next book! It’s been so long since I’ve gotten invested in an actively releasing series that I really must get used to it again.