(This review can be found on my blog The (Mis)Adventures of a Twenty-Something Year Old Girl towards the end of September).


When I first found out about this book, I was very interested. I couldn't wait to read it! Luckily, it totally delivered.

Ryder is a 17 year old high school student who isn't very popular. Her ex-best friend makes her life a living hell at school. When Ollie arrives, he takes an immediate interest. Ryder is thrilled and feels as if Ollie is her soul mate. Not much later, Ari turns up, and Ryder can't help but feel as if she's known him. There's also some kind of attraction there. Ryder must choose between the two boys. As if that wasn't hard enough, Ryder has just found out her mother is a Greek goddess. Ryder wants to find her mother but doing so may put everyone in danger.

The title is definitely interesting. It does go with what the books about, and I think it's an awesome choice.

To be honest, I'm not really a fan of the cover. I think it's just a personal thing simply because I'm not a big fan of symbolism. I do like the whole pretty flower in the midst of dead things, but I just don't like it for this book. It doesn't really say much about the book.

The world building is alright. There's a few things that hurt the world building. For example, it seemed to me that Ryder just accepted everything she was told at face value. Sure, a few weird things are happening to her, but it's like she's told by a boy she just met, and she believes it all. Her best friend is even worse. He's told that Ryder is a half-goddess, and he just believes it with no questions asked. Also, I don't really think this whole curse is explained well enough. In fact, I'm still a little confused about the curse. So if both guys find her, even if she chooses one, she'll die a horrible death and be reincarnated? I'm just wondering how long she has before she dies because it just seemed like the curse wasn't that imminent. There's also Ryder's powers. She's had super strength since the beginning of the book, yet later on she has another super strength episode, and she acts like it's the first one she's had and is all shocked. Another thing that I found confusing was the whole reincarnation thing. She's been reincarnated by Hades for a thousand years. This life, she is a half goddess which makes things a bit difficult for Hades. Surely if Hades is the one that put the curse on her, then he should've been able to make her human. Saying that, I don't want people to think the world building is horribly written. It's far from it actually. The world is very interesting, but I just tend to over think things, I think. (See what I mean)?

The pacing is great in this book. The pacing really picks up during the Hell scenes, I thought. These were the scenes that held my attention the most although the whole book held my attention. The Hell scenes just made me want to read faster to find out what would happen next!

The plot is definitely an interesting one. I love the infusion of Greek mythology, and Ms. Lavati does an excellent job of making mythology work in her book. I've read a few books where the author tried to use some sort of mythology, and the book was just too boring. However, The Thousand Year Curse is by no means boring! There is a love triangle, and I usually hate them, but this one works in this story. I also like the fact that the plot involved going into Hell. That was definitely a good move on Ms. Lavati's part to include it in her book. There's no cliff hangar ending, but there are questions left unanswered to make way for the second book in the series. I, personally, am looking forward to the next book in the series.

The characters were written really well. I liked Ryder, and I liked how she dealt with her problems. At times, I did get annoyed with her because I just wanted her to choose one guy. However, I would have to remind myself that without this problem, there'd be no series. Ryder felt like a real girl and not just words on a paper. Ollie was written really well, but I just didn't like him. For one, I felt like he was just too serious. I also felt like he was too distant with Ryder a lot of the time. I also wanted to see more about Ollie in the book. My favorite character was Ari. I swooned over Ari! He had enough of that bad boy personality without being too much of an annoying character. I liked how he liked to take chances, and it seemed like he knew how to have fun. I'm Team Ari all the way! I'm hoping that Ryder ends up with Ari in the long run. I can actually feel the chemistry between those two.

There are quite a lot of grammar errors in this book. I feel that it does affect the quality of the book a little bit, but not so much so that it makes it unreadable. However, the dialogue in this book is fantastic especially in the scenes that Ari is in. (Okay, so I'm a bit biased). The characters all speak like they're from this time period even though two of them are gods. I was super thankful the characters spoke like normal people. I've read a book before where the character who is a god spoke rather strangely hence why I was so happy with the dialogue in this book.

Overall, The Thousand Year Curse by Taylor Lavati is an enjoyable read. Sure, it could do with some better editing and the world building could've used a little bit of work, but it's still really interesting. Plus, I've learned that Ms. Lavati wrote this book in 30 days for the NaNoWriMo competition. After learning that, my respect for Ms. Lavati went up a lot! To write a book as good as The Thousand Year Curse in 30 days is no small feat. After saying that, I'm definitely looking forward to reading the next book in the series!

I'd recommend this book to those aged 17 who are after a fantastic book with Greek mythology infusions.


(I was provided with a free paperback copy of this title from the author in exchange for a fair and honest review). ( )

*I received this book from the Author in exchange for an Honest Review*

This book follows "Ryder" Mason. A girl who's not as normal as she thinks, with a best friend just as much an outcast as she is, and the two hottest new guys at school (Ollie and Ari) wanting to date her.
I will begin by saying that this book has a lot of editing errors in it. There were several times I had to go back and reread to make sure I'd read correctly and then let my brain replace what needed to fixed. This book can witout a doubt use an editing overhaul.
However, despite the amount of errors I noticed within the work, the story itself is amazing. I love the topic of Greek Mthology and when you have two hot gods taking precidence in a story, I'll definitely read it!
The contrasting differences between Ollie and Ari don't just stop at their looks, it goes further to include that even personality wise, the two are polar opposites in everything. Ryder is pretty much your typical outcast girl. Emotional, broken, petrified, and despite having her best friend Junior, she's pretty much alone.
Junior I found to be quite an amusing character. I'd like to see more of him in upcoming books in the series.
Even with all the errors, I found the story engaging, and was absolutely drawn into the world Taylor built for Ryder. The sex scene, there's only one, isn't as steamy as some will like, but it's an emotional scene and one I found myself smiling through. The reader will definitely feel the electricity flowing between Ryder and her boys and will have a hard time figuring out who to root for.
I think anyone that enjoys Greek Mythology, Romance, and stories about people discovering their true worth, will enjoy this book. I know I did and I look forward to getting to read The Curse of Betrayal, the second book in this series.
While I want to give this book a 5, there are just too many errors to overlook. If the author gets them corrected I will adjust my rating. For now though...
I give this book 4 of 5 paws ( )

Review to come. 3.5 stars ( )