Manhattan has many secrets. Some are older than the city itself.

Book Review:  Winter of the Gods by Jordanna Max Brodsky

It's been 3 months since Selene (Artemis), a few of her fellow Greek gods, and a Professor of Classic Mythology, worked together to uncover a cult trying to resurrect the Eleusinian Mysteries.  She's in a foul mood -- she hasn't punished a wrongdoer in at least a week, and it's December in Manhattan -- all of the hallmarks of Christmas are grating on her nerves -- she has a lot of rage to vent.  She is enjoying getting cozy with Professor Theo Shulz, however.  When he's not singing or humming Christmas carols, that is.  Or joking about sex.  She says that she spent enough time being what mankind imagined, and now she will decide who she is -- but she's not entirely sure it works that way.  Her powers are already significantly diminished from what they were when men believed in her.  What happens if she chooses to let go of her chastity, one of the main attributes men imbued her with?

That's a question she'll have to come back to.  Another cult has made a sacrifice, a man sprawled atop Wall Street's Charging Bull statue, surrounded by a variety of ritualistic symbols.  When she and Theo receive the call from Detective Freeman, Selene assumes the worst -- that her fellow gods are replicating the methods used by Orion, in the hopes of regaining their former powers.  She's wrong -- this time it's the gods who are being sacrificed.  But by whom and why?

Aside of Selene's choice of punishment for a rapist, which seems likely to have consequences for the bears involved (which she should have considered), I really enjoyed this book.  The mystery is excellent.  What I loved though is that Brodsky again writes her characters true to the original myths but allows for believable growth and regret.  All of the gods have acted rashly and criminally over the millennia and this storyline confronts them with their misdeeds.

I may not have bought the quick romance between Selene and Theo in the first book, The Immortals, but I bought the relationship struggles they face in this book.  Utterly and completely.  And I was happy with the way things were between them at the end.  We'll see what happens in the next book, Olympus Bound.  It's checked out and on my nightstand at home!