Book Review: The Winter Goddess by Megan Barnard

The Winter Goddess by Megan Barnard

Book title: The Winter Goddess
Author: Megan Barnard
Genre: Mythological retelling, historical fantasy
Published: March 11, 2025
304 pages
My rating: 3.5/5

“I don’t know how old I was, but a child still, and Danu and I had been walking through the deep parts of the forest, heading back to Tara. I was holding her hand and she was talking of this and that – Danu was always talking – when we crested the slope of a small hill, entering a clearing ringed with huge fir trees. I tilted my face up to see where they seemed to graze the sky and watched as something brushed the very tops of the branches – something white and gentle and mesmerizing. Snow, I somehow understood, though I had never seen it before.”

Cailleach, the goddess of winter, despises selfish and destructive humans. When her sacred grove is destroyed, she unleashes a brutal winter, killing hundreds of people. As a punishment, her mother Danu, the queen of the gods, sends her to live on earth among the people she disdains until she understands what it’s like to be a mortal.

The Winter Goddess is Megan Barnard’s historical fantasy inspired by Gaelic mythology. The concept was fascinating, and I wanted to like this book, but it let me down. For the longest time, I could not figure out what the book was trying to say. It felt that it either had the wrong main character or was telling the story in the wrong way.

Book Review: Cecilia by Frances Burney

Cecilia by Frances Burney

Book title: Cecilia
Author: Frances Burney
Genre: Classic
Published: 1782
1004 pages
My rating: 4/5

Cecilia Beverley is an heiress who can only keep her fortune if her husband agrees to take her surname. Surrounded by fortune-hunters and other people who want to use her money for their own gain, the beautiful and virtuous Cecilia has to navigate the world with only the help of three questionable guardians. She falls in love with Mortimer Delvile, the son of one of her guardians, but his father insists that he keeps the family name, and it seems impossible they will ever have their happy ending.

Cecilia, or Memoirs of an Heiress is Frances Burney’s second novel, published in 1782. I started this book for this year’s Jane Austen July, but as the book is closer to thousand pages (plus foreword and appendices), it took me over two months to finish it. I don’t usually mind long classics, but Cecilia was way too long.

Book Review: The Hurricane Wars by Thea Guanzon

The Hurricane Wars by Thea Guanzon

Book title: The Hurricane Wars
Author: Thea Guanzon
Genre: Romantasy
Published: October 3, 2023
470 pages
My rating: 3.5/5

“He heard the girl before he saw her, a high and golden hum that cut through the chaos of battle like the first flare of sunrise.”

Having grown up as an orphan in a nation occupied by The Night Empire, Talasyn has only ever known the Hurricane Wars. She uses the power of light to fight for freedom, but everything changes when she uncovers the secret of her past. Alaric Ossinast, on the other hand, wields shadow magic to crush those who stand in the way of the Night Empire. But then he clashes with Talasyn, and soon they are thrust into an uneasy alliance to save the world.

The Hurricane Wars is the first book in Thea Guanzon’s adult romantasy trilogy. If you want an enemies-to-lovers fantasy where a petite and helpless woman learns to use her powers and spends half of the book marveling at how tall and solid and muscular the dark and brooding love interest is, you’ll probably enjoy The Hurricane Wars.

August Wrap-Up and September Hopefuls

August reads

August Wrap-Up

• Finished: 5
• Started/continued but not finished: 4
• Total pages read: 1,949
• Average rating: 4.8

August was another great reading month for me. Four of the five books I finished were five stars, and one was four stars. The two fiction books I’ve written longer reviews of were both written by Madeline Miller, novel-length Circe (5/5 stars) and short story Galatea (5/5 stars). Needless to say, I loved them both! Click the links to read more about my thoughts.

Book Review: Galatea by Madeline Miller

Galatea by Madeline Miller

Book title: Galatea
Author: Madeline Miller
Genre: Ancient retelling, fantasy, short story
Published: First published in 2013; this edition from 2022
49 pages
My rating: 5/5

It was almost sweet the way they worried about me.
“You’re so pale,” the nurse said. “You must keep quiet until your color returns.”
“I’m always this colour,” I said. “Because I used to be made of stone.”

Galatea is Madeline Miller’s short story that retells the myth of the sculptor Pygmalion and his statue-come-to-life Galatea. The short story is based on Ovid’s Metamorphoses, which narrates several ancient myths where people become animals or plants, or as in the case of this myth, an inanimate object comes to life. In Ovid’s version, sculptor Pygmalion is horrified by “shameless” and “lascivious” prostitutes and instead carves himself a woman from ivory, making her more perfect than any woman can be. He falls in love with his creation and after many prayers, the goddess Venus brings the statue to life. Ovid's version seems to indicate that the couple lives happily ever after.

Favorite Classics: E.M. Forster

Three novels by E.M. Forster

Edward Morgan Forster (1879–1970) was an English author who published six novels as well as short stories, essays, and other works. I’ve read three of Forster’s novels and his influential work of literary criticism, Aspects of the Novel. I still want to read at least A Passage to India and Maurice, a posthumously published love story between two men.

Book Review: Circe by Madeline Miller

Circe by Madeline Miller

Book title: Circe
Author: Madeline Miller
Genre: Ancient retelling, historical fantasy
Published: April 10, 2018
333 pages
My rating: 5/5

“When I was born, the name for what I was did not exist. They called me nymph, assuming I would be like my mother and aunts and thousand cousins. Least of the lesser goddesses, our powers were so modest they could scarcely ensure our eternities.”

Circe is not like her parents, the terrifying sun god Helios or the alluring nymph Perse. Slighted by other Titans, including her own family, she seeks the companionship of mortals instead and discovers she has a dark power of her own. When she turns her witchcraft against her own kind, Zeus banishes her to a deserted island, where she hones her craft and tames wild beasts. But even banishment doesn’t stop her from crossing paths with many famous figures, including the beastly Minotaur, the sorceress Medea, and wily Odysseus.

Circe is a retelling of the ancient Greek myth of the powerful witch Circe who transformed men into swine until she was bested by Odysseus in Homer’s The Odyssey. I loved Madeline Miller’s The Song of Achilles when I read it a few years ago, and I was excited to read her second novel. It wasn’t quite the emotional ride The Song of Achilles offered, but I still loved this book.