The Goddess Test

March 7, 2011
In Carter's first YA novel, the Greek pantheon isn't just down to Earth, it's occupying Eden, Mich., and attending high school. Kate Winters doesn't notice anything special about classmates Ava, James, and Dylan, but pale-eyed Henry gets her attention when he appears to resurrect Ava from the dead after a malicious prank goes horribly wrong. Kate can't quite believe that Henry is the god of the underworld, as he claims, but she also can't dismiss him. Kate's mother is dying of cancer, and Kate is willing to grasp at anything that might win her one more loving maternal conversation. The bargain she strikes with Henry is a grim one, but the full enormity of what she has undertaken—"live forever or die trying"—is not revealed until it's too late to recant. Carter wears her influences openly, with many passages reading like outtakes from Robin McKinley's Beauty by way of Neil Gaiman's Sandman. Nevertheless, the narrative is well executed, and Kate is a heroine better equipped than most to confront and cope with the inexplicable. Ages 13–18.