Customer Reviews

An Accidental Goddess (Bantam Spectra)

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

It's about time they got someone writing this sort of hybrid story who understands both parent genera. Most of the books out there sold as futuristic, or SF, romances are so bad that I'm embarrassed for the authors. They are lame romances, horrid SF, and something of an insult to the readers they are marketed toward.

Ms. Sinclair's work does not fall into that category. This book works as a Romance and a Space Opera, although the SF setting does not work quite as well as the settings in Finder's Keepers or Gabriel's Ghost. Sure this is brain candy, but it's really good brain candy, a fun read and a wonderful escape from the stress of the real world.

I've put Sinclair on my A list of writers. I'm looking forward to reading her future works.

Captain Gillaine Davre of the Raheiran Special Forces, the Kiasidira, had just barely escaped the Fav'lhir attack by traveling through the Rift. The Fav'lhir followed her and were destroyed, decimating the Fav'lhir's mageline or line of sorcerers. So when she woke up in a sick bay, she wasn't too surprised. After all, she did get a pretty nasty bump on her head. However, Gillie quickly discovers that she is 342 years in the future. Somehow the conflict between her ship and the Fav'lhir projected her into the future. And, even worse, the Khalarans, the people she was protecting, have made her a goddess! Gillie knows that she needs to keep her head down, repair her ship and beat it out of there before anyone discovers who she is, but Admiral Rynan Makarian already seems a little too interested...

Admiral Rynan "Make It Right" Makarian, Mack to his friends, is the youngest and newest Admiral in the Khalaran Fleet. His reputation for perfection and excellent track record land him on Cirrus One, the preliminary project for the Rim Gate Project, or a gate that will link the remote corner of the galaxy with the rest of the Khalaran Confederation. Everything that could go wrong seems to, from the civilians refusing to cooperate with the Fleet personnel, the magefather having delusions of grandeur - and the dratted parrots that no one can seem to get rid of! The last thing he needs is the beautiful Gillie, whom he mistakenly assumes is a smuggler, distracting him from his duties.

Mack first hangs around Gillie because he is suspicious of her, but quickly falls in love with her. When Mack proposes to Gillie after she has been on Cirrus One for a week, Gillie is shocked - but very, very tempted. For the first time in her life, Gillie starts to imagine what it would be like to be just plain old Gillie - not the Kiasidira, not a Raheiran sorceress, but just a woman who loves a man. For a short time, it seems that Gillie's dream will come true, but then Gillie discovers that the magefather is Melandan, the ancient enemy of the Khalarans. When Carrick Blass, a mageline sorcerer of the Melandan people arrives on board Cirrus One, Gillie knows she has to make a choice - protect the Khalarans, as she swore an oath to do and risk losing Mack's love or to let the Khalarans be destroyed, which is no choice at all...

An Accidental Goddess is the far future sequel to Wintertide, Baker's excellent fantasy novel and is just as entertaining. Gillie was a great character and I could totally empathize with her tough decisions. If she revealed who she truly was, the Kiasidira, she would disrupt centuries of religious worship in the Khalaran culture and knew that the people would never look at her the same. Mack was a great hero, very intelligent and able to figure out a lot of Gillie's history on his own, but not really wanting to believe what he found out. Mack's crew were also wonderful characters, as was Simon, Gillie's sentient computer/ship who was one of my favorite characters - I would love to see him in a story of his own! Anyway, the characters were fabulous and well developed, even the wretched villains, and the setting was great. I felt that the story had a good sense of history (because I read Wintertide first, I understood a lot of the religious connotations better, but it is not necessary to read Wintertide first) and a very developed world with all aspects of life covered - food, healing, religion, military, politics, etc. The cost is a bit steep for Megan Baker's books, but I can assure you that they are well worth the cost! (If you want a cheaper copy, look to buy them in ebook format.)

An Accidental Goddess is not going to win either Hugo and Nebula awards for the SF content or the equivalent prizes as a romance. But it is good fun.

Captain Gillaine Davre, or "Gillie", is a military advisor from a highly advanced race called the Raheirans to their slightly less advanced allies, the Khalarans. The Khalarans are themselves advanced enough to operate interstellar space ships and space stations, but both the Raheirans and a hostile race, the evil Fav'lhir, are so advanced that some of their abiliites seem like magic to the Khalarans.

The book makes frequent reference to magic: Linnea Sinclair appears to have deliberately allowed the reader to interpret these references in either of two different ways. You can take them literally, or assume that Raheiran technology is so advanced that it meets the saying by Arthur C Clarke that "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

At the start of the book, Gillie wakes up in the sickbay of her ship after a battle in which they have destroyed an enemy vessel belonging to the Fav'lhir.

It is a nasty shock to find that a side effect of the battle has been to throw her 342 years and 18 hours into the future. It is a much worse one to discover that during that interval the Khalarans have started worshipping her as a Goddess.

Gillie promply gets herself into all kinds of amusing scrapes. On the one hand she has no desire to be regarded as a deity, which she certainly is not, on the other she doesn't want to start trampling on other people's religious beliefs and risk destabilising Khalaran society by doing so. To complicate matters further, she becomes romanticaly involved with the Admiral commanding the Khalaran fleet in the sector - a man who worships her in a rather different way than she would have preferred.

There are all manner of logical inconsistencies in the book and things which are never explained. For instance, it is not clear why the Raheiran central government appears to have done nothing to replace their envoy to a key sector of the galaxy who was missing and presumed killed in action for 342 years. Nevertheless it is easy to forget about these issues while you are reading the book and just enjoy it.

The plot is listed above in an excellent synopsis. This author hands us a solid Space Opera Scifantasy novel with a bonus romance thrown in for fun. I found this one in the SciFi section which was refreshing because so many times I wish for more romance in my scifi. The characters where interesting and the plot different. A little futuristic, a little Fantasy, a lot scifi... with definite highlights of romance and action adventure- this book is a must read for people who like both scifi and romance and a strong recommend for anyone that likes one or the other. I am now off to hunt down the rest of her books....

"An Accidental Goddess" centers on G--, a female star ship captain & powerful mage who is acting as a consultant & advisor to a technologically backward race of humans. G-- wakes up to find herself (and her telepathic ship, S--) 342 years in the future, with no recollection of how they got there. G-- and S-- have been taken to a star base, where Admiral M-- is convinced G-- must be a smuggler. Which wouldn't be so bad, except that somehow, over the interveening 342 years, the locals started believing that she is a goddess. And her ship needs repair. The last thing G-- wants is for someone to recognize her!

This story's plot is quite entertaining and fun, and leans more toward Fantasy than SciFi. The Fantasy plot is entertaining and deserves 5-stars. Religion is treated with a relatively light hand, nothing offensive. My problem with this book is the 3-star Romance between G-- and M--, which dominates the text. This romance gets way too caught up in fretting and worrying and jealousy. This sub-plot includes explicit sex scenes that may offend some readers.

"An Accidental Goddess" is fast paced and entertaining, a nicely done light entertainment. This is a stand alone novel, written primarily from G--'s point of view.

Captain Gillaine Davré regained consciousness in a strange sick bay. The last thing she could recall was having combat with the Fav'lhir in Riftspace. She soon learned that she and her sentient crystal-ship named Simon had been catapulted forward in time 342 years. After absorbing that shocking blow more quickly follow. History believed Gillie had died, sacrificing herself, in that battle to save the Khalaran race. She had been immortalized as the Goddess Kiasidira!

Admiral Rynan "Mack" Makarian commanded the space station Cirrus One and was dead of the critical Rim Gate Project. He soon realized Gillie was his destiny, his soulmate. He knew Gillie kept many secrets, by omissions, from everyone and that miracles often happened whenever she was around, but he was positive she would reveal all sooner or later.

Gillie kept her true identity and Raheiran abilities a close secret. To reveal the truth would destroy the Khalaran society that had already raised generations on her little aphorisms. But when the Fav'lhir attack, after being silent over 300 years, Gillie must find a way to save the Khalaran race all over again! There was simply not enough bottles of Devil's Breath in the station's bars to help her get through it all!

***** Simon is short for "Sentient Integrated MObile Nanoessence". Via telepathy, one of several abilities she has, Gillie and Simon communicate. As you can see, most of this novel is Sci-Fi. However, the author makes the story more intriguing by adding several touches of Fantasy elements such as a mageline sorceress and a touch of spacestation romance. It all blends together to make an awesome drama that will keep you on the edge of your seat and holding your breath! BRAVA! *****

Reviewed by Detra Fitch of Huntress Reviews.

An Accidental Goddess was the first Linnea Sinclair book I read. I loved the writing style, Ms. Sinclair's sense of humor and the romantic interaction. My first comment to the friend who had given me the book was how human the main characters were in their interaction (no sudden "animal" MUST HAVE attractions)as attraction grew from respect, liking and then trust. Very refreshing and rather addictive character creation!
Loved the book:)

This was the first book I read by Linnea Sinclair and I wasn't disappointed. Its an entertaining novel and fun read, though it does lack that special something that makes a truly spectacular book. In spite of this lack its a great book I highly recommend reading.

Captain Gilliane Davre of Raheiran Special Forces and her sentient crystal ship Simon, destroy an enemy Fav'lir ship in Rift Space. The unintended side effect of the battle is that Gilliane and Simon are catapulted 342 years into the future. Gilliane wakes up in the sick bay of Cirrus One, a deep space station on the edge of the Rim Worlds. To her shock and horror people have turned her into a Goddess. Instead of viewing her battle manoeuver as a military strategy, its viewed as a "Sacred Sacrifice" by the Lady Kiasidira in order to save the Kahlar people. There are temples built in her name and a huge holovid of her from her graduation. But that seems the least of Gilliane's worries when she discovers that at least one of the enemy Fav'lir mageline has survived the battle. As a Kiasidira (highest level of mages), its Gilliane's duty to put an end to his evil plot. But matters soon become even more complicated when she falls in love with station master and military admiral Rynan Makarian, a devout believer in the Goddess Lady Kiasidira. Will he still love her if he finds out who she is, and that the goddess he worships is a fraud?


I loved the book, but I do have to agree with the previous reviewer that it would have been nicer to know more about Raheiran culture. Why did they never send another Raheiran military adviser? Why has no Raheiran been seen in 342 years? Its seems very odd to me that they wouldn't have sent someone in all those years. Besides that minor complaint this is a great book you'll enjoy reading.

I think that Goddess' new cover (the purple) has a very nifty looking space station pictured on it, but the original cover conveys more of what Gillie is like. Plus its what caught my eye and dove me into Sinclair's books. For some reason I thought it was Jem (as in Jem and the Holograms, that 80's rock cartoon) and bought it for that reason. A happy happenstance! And yes for some reason I've been convinced its 'The Accidental Goddess' not 'An Accidental Goddess'. I also think the new covers have less scifi to them and more romance (though they are now carried in the romance section, not scifi like when I got Accidental Goddess years ago).

The Accidental Goddess is fun. Pure and simple. Gillie is a sassy, clever and tough while Mack is the sort of guy girls fall over themselves for. Caring, hard working, witty, and passionate. Who doesn't want that? Their romance alternately made me laugh and sigh in exasperation as Gillie tried to work around what she couldn't tell him and he tried to work what she did tell him into a semblance of order. Simon was a welcome addition to the plight--definitely like an older brother who couldn't resist ribbing his little sister at every possible chance. I could easily see him regaling Mack with tales from Gillie's childhood that would embarrass her to no end.

For me I found it simply fascinating how the Khalaran evolved the myth of Gillie to such epic proportions. Obviously its not dissimilar to what must have happened back in the days of Ancient cultures for us. Gillie's response was perfectly understandable and what she said to Mack was true--what if in hundreds of years people are worshiping him for just doing his duty? How would he feel when faced with that?

I'd argue for a sequel/companion novel just to read about how this newest chapter in the Lady Kiasidira's legecy is effected. Gillie and Mack tried to do damage control, but there's no guarantee that it won't be taken the exact opposite way. Luckily it didn't seem as if there were any prophecies indicating that the Lady Kiasidira would return to the Khalaran people during their darkest hour. I'm not sure any amount of damage control could have helped her then!

I would have liked to see, or at least a mention of, the Raheiran's reaction to Gillie's deification and her resurrection. The end seemed to suggest they still had business with the Khalaran's even after her death, so I wonder at the fact they didn't halt the worship of her. That was their Prime Directive more or less--nurture not interfere, help don't command, wouldn't Gillie being revered as a Goddess go against those precepts?

Ok, I actually read this book a while ago- and just re-read it and realized more folks need to know how great it is. Linnea Sinclair creates some serious kick-butt female characters with heart, wit, and wisdom in worlds that are often dominated by stiff talking men. Just the premise of the story had me in stitches and her handling of of it made this book one of my favorites. Goddess by accident is a great concept, and the characters were warm, funny, and above all intellegent. My only complaint right now, is the new cover- sorry, not loving the new look at all- it's a nit pick but it really doesn't lend much to the story itself. (I know this isn't an author thing, nor really about the book- but in case someone is thinking about this book- but not sure on the cover? Ignore it-LOL The book is so much more than what it looks like). If the publisher's reading this- liked the original cover better-sorry.

I have read all of Linnea Sinclair's books- and I have to say this one is still my favorite (a few others come very, very, close though ;)). If you haven't read her yet- you have a treat ahead of you.