Goddess of Spring by P.C. Cast

Lina Santoro is the owner of a Bakery in Tulsa, Oklahoma, but the business that she loves so much and staked so much of her life on is in trouble. Due to what she suspects is embezzling and some definite bad advice by her accountant, she is in danger of losing the business she worked so hard to grow for 20 years. She is devastated at the thought of losing it, so she goes out to find something new she can add to the menu to bring in some more money.

When a patron comes in and mentions she is holding a dinner for the local artists association, Lina bites the bullet and offers to cater the entire dinner for her. The woman agrees, and says she'll come by on Monday to talk over her menu choices. Lina is forced to confess all to her employees and goes home early to brainstorm menu choices. On her way, she stops and buys ten Italian Cookbooks and goes home to look them over for recipes. She finds four, and in the last book, she finds a recipie for "Pizza by the Meter" that can be made anywhere up to six feet long by slowly stretching the dough in the oven.

Part of the recipe is also a spell to Demeter, Goddess of Agriculture, and Lina performs the invocation. As part of it, she takes a small bit of the dough to give to the goddess. After leaving the dough to set overnight, and cleaning her kitchen, she goes outside to return the dough to the earth and begs Demeter for help in saving her business, saying she will do anything in return for the goddess's help. On her way back into her house, she finds an exquisite narcissus blossom and bends to smell it. When she does, she is somehow pulled into the bloom and ends up in the Realm of Demeter.

There, the goddess has a proposition for her. She will send her daughter Demeter to earth and save Lina's bakery business in return for Lina taking Persephone's body to Hades's Kingdom in the Underworld. Hades needs the touch of a Goddess, and Persephone has been asked to do the job. Or, Lina in Persephone's body. Unlike the stories, Hades will not rape Persephone. But she will be under his protection while she is there. And she will have a guide who is newly dead to help her.

Lina agrees, and meets her guide, Euridyce, who guides her to Hades. Hades and his steeds make an appearance, and she finds that the horses seem to love her. But Hades takes her aback as well, for far from the dark, cruel god she was expecting, she gets ancient Batman, minus the mask and Batmobile. And sexy, which she was also hardly expecting. Hades, too, is stunned by Lina, who, despite her appearance as Persephone, radiates a maturity and dignity somewhat at odds with her youthful appearance.

But as Lina brings a touch of spring and renewal to the Underworld, she begins to understand how intelligent and focussed Hades is, and slowly falls in love with him while charming all the spirits and creatures of the underworld. He, too, finds himself falling for this strangely wise and mature young goddess, but how will he feel when he finds out that Lina lied to him, and that she isn't really Persephone at all? Can she survive being hated and scorned by a God of the Dead?

Another great P.C. Cast book that I took the time to savor. The descriptions of the Underworld and of Hades himself are beautiful, and while they are in keeping with the legends around him, there is an extra something there that transforms the "same old, same old" from the legend into something beautiful and new. I also loved the character of Hades. The other Gods don't know him well, he seems grim and horrible. But Lina is able to uncover the truth about him: just like Zeus and Poseidon, Hades is interested in the welfare of his Underworld home, and with doing it right all the time. He has no time to sport with nymphs. And Lina, a businesswoman herself, understands him in a way the real Persephone wouldn't.

Watching how they slowly came together, each in love with each other long before they actually make love, was wonderful, and I felt more than a bit misty-eyed at times. Needless to say, most readers will end up wanting Hades themselves, and no more so for me then when Hades spied Persephone at her bath. The feelings he was feeling, and the words describing the scene made me long for a man who wanted me in just that way. And the ending of the book? Well, it made me cry- tears of sadness, tears of joy. So wonderful and beautiful and right, and if that makes me a sap, so be it. Sappy isn't always a bad thing, not when it's written this well.

I can't recommend this series highly enough, and this book especially. Lina isn't a blushing virgin, but a real, honest-to-god woman, mature in attitude and voluptuous in body. Too many romances seem to assert the primacy of the young, innocent girl tutored in her sexuality by an older, worldly-wise man, and this turns that scenario right on its head. Hades, by virtue of being an immortal God, may be older than Lina, but she is the one with more romantic experience, and she brings it to the party, while he contributes a raw, honest sensuality that turns the heat up in spades. Miss this book, and you'll end up kicking yourself. Read it, and see why I loved it so much.