Persephone by Kaitlin Bevis

Genre:  YA Mythology

Daughters of Zeus Series, Book 1

Kaitlin Bevis' website

Amazon | Goodreads

Description (taken from Kaitlin Bevis' website):

There are worse things than death, worse people too.

The “talk” was bad enough, but how many teens get told that they’re a goddess? When her mom tells her, Persephone is sure her mother has lost her mind. It isn’t until Boreas, the god of winter, tries to abduct her that she realizes her mother was telling the truth. Hades rescues her, and in order to safely bring Persephone to the Underworld he marks her as his bride. But Boreas will stop at nothing to get Persephone.

Despite her growing feelings for Hades, Persephone wants to return to the living realm. Persephone must find a way to defeat Boreas and reclaim her life.

What an original mythology telling.  Note how I say telling instead of retelling.  It's not a Persephone-Hades love story retelling, it is THE Persephone-Hades love story told in a modern day era.  And it's sweet and beautiful.

Persephone doesn't really know who she is until people come after her.  These people know more about her than she does.  This kind of forces Demeter to tell Persephone the truth about her heritage and that she will live forever as a goddess.  But a plot to kidnap her forces Hades to react without thinking.  And down to the underworld she goes to hide and learn more about who she is.

What I loved about this series:  the Underworld was cool.  I thought how it behaved was awesome.  I wish there were more dealings down there and lots more descriptions to go with it (I guess I just want to spend a couple of days there - without having to die first).  Hades - he was the bad-good guy that anyone could love.  Definitely want to see more of this romance come into play.  Really, the only thing I had issue with (besides wanting more of this story) was the climatic fight scene towards the end went too quickly.

It's never a bad thing when a reader says the only downfall to the story is it wasn't enough to sate her curiosity.  I want more!  Luckily, there's another book in this series (hurray).  Yep, off to the second one soon.