Goddess in the Machine by Lora Beth Johnson

**We received an finished e-copy of this book from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. We’d like to thank Lora and Razorbill for the opportunity**

Reviewed by Sam!

What I drank prior: so this was probably the worst week of work i’ve ever had in my life so when Minda’s Husband is like “who want’s to get drunk tonight?” I immediatley say ME so I started drinking. All of us watched Lilo and Stitch and then did a disney power hour and i had only vodka and wine. I’m hammered.

For the record, when I talk about the Disney group, it’s Minda, her hubby, Ginny, and another couple friend of ours… lovingly known as the Pe*****s. We’ve been watching all the animated Disney movies in chronological order.

Goodreads Overview:

When Andra wakes up, she’s drowning.

Not only that, but she’s in a hot, dirty cave, it’s the year 3102, and everyone keeps calling her Goddess. When Andra went into a cryonic sleep for a trip across the galaxy, she expected to wake up in a hundred years, not a thousand. Worst of all, the rest of the colonists—including her family and friends—are dead. They died centuries ago, and for some reason, their descendants think Andra’s a deity. She knows she’s nothing special, but she’ll play along if it means she can figure out why she was left in stasis and how to get back to Earth.

Zhade, the exiled bastard prince of Eerensed, has other plans. Four years ago, the sleeping Goddess’s glass coffin disappeared from the palace, and Zhade devoted himself to finding it. Now he’s hoping the Goddess will be the key to taking his rightful place on the throne—if he can get her to play her part, that is. Because if his people realize she doesn’t actually have the power to save their dying planet, they’ll kill her.

With a vicious monarch on the throne and a city tearing apart at the seams, Zhade and Andra might never be able to unlock the mystery of her fate, let alone find a way to unseat the king, especially since Zhade hasn’t exactly been forthcoming with Andra. And a thousand years from home, is there any way of knowing that Earth is better than the planet she’s woken to?

Drunk Overview: So basically, this is the story of “let’s go into cryo sleep on the way to the next planet” gone wrong. Andra wakes up after what was supposed to be 100 years to her parents and sibling to a stranger and a wasteland. Turns out it’s been 1,000 years and the dude that wakes her up thinks shes a goddess….There’s these scary voids that are taking over the landscape and a weird dictator who doesn’t know what he’s doing… things sort of go from there.

Spoiler-free Thoughts: I expected this to be the same. I expected this to be a sci fi chosen one story. That’s not what I got and I loved it.

Characters: Andra is pretty great, she’s like WTF guys, where am I? And never once tries to be something she’s not intentionally. The dude that wakes her is real weird but also super endearing. I think his name starts with Z. I know there’s a romance ehre but like,.. that’s not the point of the book and that’s so refreshing i don’t think you undersatnd. like, it was so pleasing to know that it didn’t matter. it didn’t matter if they got together cause it wasn’t the point of the story. The side characters are amazing, they all have unique stories that don’t only serve the purpose of supporting the main story, it’s awesome.

Plot: There were some moments in this that… i wasn’t sure of. It was a bit slow for a while but I was so interested in the final outcome that it didn’t really matter. So… like they set up this whole thing about the voids and that this “bubble” is dying and then had some slow spots, but all in the spirit of fixing these things so… I need more.

Writing Style: So this is where a lot of this was tough. We get the perspective from Zhade, who’s from this “future” and it’s a future version of English. It doesn’t quite match with ours and it’s not as bad as clockwork orange but it’s somewhere in between where we are now and that. It takes you out of the story a bit but I will say that at about the 50% mark either the author chills out with the weird speak or you get used to it enough that it you understnad it… weird? probably. idk…

World Building: YO the end of thos book makes you want more. 

What to pair it with: This is liek… This is like a strawberry cosmo… something that’s normal but not super normal and also strong and WEIRD.

Rating: 3.75/5 Shots

COMMENT DOWN BELOW: What did you think of this book? Anyone else struggle with the “Goddess” language?

Until next time, we remain forever drunkenly yours,
Sam