Goddess Of The Rose (Goddess Summoning #4) By: P.C Cast (Book Review)

 ***This review will contain spoilers***

Summary:

When modern-day Mikki ends up in the strange Realm of the Rose, Hecate has been waiting for her. So too has her gorgeous guardian beast, who soon has Mikki swooning. But to save the realm, Mikki will have to sacrifice her life-giving blood.

This is the fourth installment of Cast's Goddess Summoning series and I absolutely loved it! This story had a few different references from Mythology and from a well known story. We had a mix of Beauty and the Beast mixed in with the story of the Minotaur from the Island of Crete. The way Cast interwove everything was definitely different and not something I have read so far. Even when 'the beast' or aka Asterius was retelling how he came to be it was totally different to how we know the story of the Minotaur to be. There have been many renditions of the Minotaur but none that have depicted Cronus as being his father. More so, most renditions depict him as having the body of a man and the head and tail of a bull. However, Cast wrote him as being fully covered in fur while Hecate was the one who gave him the spirit of a man. 

The pivotal god or goddess in this story is Hecate. She is the triple faced goddess of magic, witchcraft and is associated with torches which she is depicted in carrying in this book. What I found interesting in this book when it came to Hecate was her allowing her own Priestesses being sacrificed every year in the realm of the rose. Hecate has been known to be very protective of young girls and women which didn't make a lot of sense as to why she would allow her own Priestesses to be sacrificed, especially, by a man/beast. A man being sacrificed every year makes more sense but I digress. 

The actual substance of the story was nice and I like how every book we're introduced to a new set of magical beings. This time around it's more so focused on magic and invoking elements into a sacred circle which is on theme for Hecate. We are introduced to elementals and our main character Mikki is a descendent of a line of Priestesses so she has the ability to invoke elements and exercise her own magical abilities. 

I enjoyed how the story was falling into place. The Priestess who manipulated Asterius to help her escape was the same Priestess that gave Mikki the anointing oil used in the ritual of invoking Hecate. That same Priestess is Mikki's ancestor in the mundane world and who her lineage derives from. From the Priestesses' line is a woman who falls in love with the same beast who got manipulated by said Priestess. I love full circle moments and while I did feel like once Mikki was in the realm of the rose her relationship with the beast wasn't as developed as I would have liked before they 'fell in love' they very much do compliment each other. 

One part of the story that I found fascinating were the dream stealers aka Hatred, Fear, Envy and Selfishness taking on the form of men and tricking Mikki into letting them into her realm. I thought it genius calling those emotions dream stealers because if you really think about it, if your life is filled with such emotions on a constant basis it will keep you from achieving your divine destiny. Or your dreams. 

While I'm not exactly thrilled about sacrificing a Priestess every year, I do empathize with Mikki's selfless sacrifice in saving the realm. In return, Hecate turned Mikki into the Goddess of the Rose and the realm became hers to oversee and protect in tangent with Asterius. This is the first time we had one of the main characters turn into a goddess and I loved this little twist. 

Rating:

This book is getting 4.5 stars on 5! I loved how different this story was compared to the previous books in this series, however, there were parts of it that didn't make a lot of sense and did make me pause wondering why some things were rushed. Hence why, I'm not giving a perfect rating but it still was a great book and if I wasn't sick for a while I probably would have finished this book in days.