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Having some time before needing to get to some book club books, I wanted to try to finish up the Ripped Bodice Summer Bingo. I had three prompts left and decided to pick up Katie MacAlister's Ain't Myth-Behaving. I am a big fan of Katie MacAlister and own most of her books that aren't in her dragon series (I'm still working on collecting those). I was surprised to see that this is actually a bind up of two novellas when I picked it up. Since this is two novellas, I'll do two smaller reviews. Oh, and this covered the demi-gods prompt. Update: I applied this to the prompt of backlist for the 3rd board of Summer of Swoon.
The first novella is Stag Party.
This novella focuses on the Irish god Cernunnos, aka Dane. Every year on Beltane he gets married and secures his reign for another year. When he comes back from the Underworld (he's the god/ruler of the 5th hour), he has a week left and his wife for the past 1500+ years has decided to marry Dionysus. Luckily for him Megan, a travel writer is here to visit his castle and do an article. There's an immediate attraction and Dane immediately goes about trying to woo Megan to get married in 7 days.
I would give this novella 4-stars. It was really cute, but took a little bit for me to get into the world and situation. I don't know too much about Irish or Celtic gods, so that might have contributed to it. I also was confused on how it connected with Grecian mythos since his ex-wife marries Dionysus. I know that mythos tend to be adapted from culture to culture, but I feel like the average person would know at least the basics of the Greek Gods over Irish. It just had me confused a took me out of the story a little bit. Dane was also very arrogant and overly sure of himself, but it helped that he had good humor about everything and even though it came across wrong, he was always truthful. I was a little bit insta-love, but we are dealing with gods and their charm so it didn't bother me as much. It was fun and cute.
The second novella is Norse Truly.
Brynna is visiting family in Sweden. One night she goes to get some last minute groceries and ends up swerving to miss a deer in the road and ends up in the North Sea. She's rescued by Alrik and his friends, vikings that have been cursed. They think she's a Valkyrie and want her to help them get to Valhalla.
I loved this novella a lot more than the first. This one is the shorter of the two by about 40 pages, and I would've wanted the page length switched. Part of this could be because I'm more familiar with viking and Norse mythology. I just loved how the story played out the the mini quests they were sent on. I would give this a 4.5-star rating. The only thing I didn't like was the first time they get intimate. Brynna says she has three choices when they start kissing and getting more handsy, she could go sleep in the house, go back to sleep in the gazebo with the other vikings, or give in to Alrik and sleep with him. I almost wish that she had said yes, let's stay alone, but not go all the way. There's always another option. But she is dealing with a Viking, even if he has learned some of the modern views.
Overall I really enjoyed both of these novellas. Stag Party makes me want to pick up more Irish or Celtic inspired mythos books to learn more. I love learning about mythology and find it really interesting. I love Katie MacAlister's writing and will continue to read her. I just wish there was a little more of her humor in these novellas. That's one thing I really enjoy about her books. I also wish she'd do a full length novel set in the same world as Norse Truly. I really loved her take on Odin and would love to read more! If you love mythos retellings, definitely check this out, especially the second novella.
Have you read Ain't Myth-Behaving?
Bookishly Yours,
Stasi🍎
STATISTICS: Ain't Myth-Behaving, Katie MacAlister, 4-stars, 0 days, paperback, 353 pages, published in 2007
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