BWS Book Review: These Vengeful Gods

These Vengeful Gods, written by Gabe Cole Novoa. Image from Amazon.

These Vengeful Gods gave me [Percy Jackson + realistic issue + gladiators] vibe written into a wonderful story full of violence, heartbreak, love, and--of course-- Vengeance! And I love it! This YA book was written by Gabe Cole Novoa, author of The Wicked Bargain and The Diablo’s Curse, and will be published by Random House. Mark your calendars because it will be available for purchase by May 27, 2025. 

The Summary

The story takes place in a dystopian future in the city of Escal. The city is divided into three levels: the Godlevel, the Midlevel, and the Shallows. Years ago, the gods ordered the descendants of the god of Death to be killed. Crow (they/he) survives the genocide and hides with their uncles in the lowest and most struggling part of the city, the Shallows. Their lives change once again when their uncles are arrested and taken to the Midlevel for helping other Deathchildren escape Escal. The government made it nearly impossible for a Shallowfolk to enter the Midlevel. Crow has one option to save their uncles: enter the Tournament of the Gods and survive long enough to win the gladiator-style competition. The winner of the tournament is granted a favor from the gods. Crow plans on using the audience with the gods to demand their uncles be free--or for vengeance!

Warning! Spoilers below! You have been warned!

The Evaluation

This book reminds me of the Percy Jackson series. Crow is the chosen hero descended from a god and must fight with magic and weapons to survive. Novoa’s incorporation of greedy gods living near and being worshiped by humans gave me major Greek myth vibes. Since I grew up loving the Percy Jackson series, this book was exciting to read. 

Novoa uses the flawed system ruled by the gods to focus on a major issue that is relevant today: the wealth disparity between classes. 

 Novoa’s description of the unfair treatment towards the Shallowfolk from the resources available for the level to how Crow is treated during the tournament made me frustrated and angry with the gods, the rich, and the willful ignorant people. For example, it often floods in the Shallows and there is no public transportation available. The only dry and reliable transportation is expensive hoverbikes. In the Midlevel, the public bus is a hover vehicle even though the district has water pumps to prevent floods (114-115). In the Godlevel, the cable cars used for public transportation have expensive runes to keep them looking spotless and brand new (326). Along the story, the reader will see how those with power and resources ignored the needs of Shallows to increase the wealth of the wealthy.

Can you imagine living in a world where the rich can manipulate the system to ignore the welfare of others to increase their own wealth? By the end, I was rooting for Crow who faced off against classist snobs and the gods who orchestrated a genocide against his people. 

Strengths

• The theme of wealth disparity and classism is relevant today.

As Crow crosses the levels, they become aware of how unfair the government has been to the Shallows. “Do you not think it’s a little fucked up that the lest wealthy part of Midlevel is several levels of magnitude wealthier than the wealthiest part of the Shallows?” (Crow, 70). The theme made me think of our society and the lack of resources to struggling communities while celebrities live like gods with more wealth than they ever need.

• The fight scenes were kept interesting.

Each round of the Tournament of the Gods had different rules so each fight scene was new and different. In the first match, no weapons are allowed so the contestants use runemagic or godmagic- to fight (184). The scenes were also descriptive and had the possibility of death with the promise of violence. 

• Magic is used to change sex or gender expression.

Few fantasy books explore this possibility with magic and it's a shame. Crow uses his deathmagic to heal his body by producing elevated levels of testosterone every week. Also, he uses it to reshape his chest to get the flat shape that feels to him (16). Many characters are described as androgynous! It is well written into the magic system.

• There is LGBTQ + representation throughout the book.

There are many different LGBTQ+ representation in the book from Crow’s uncles to Crow being transmasculine. Another first for me is the main relationship in the book is a polycule with romantic and queerplatonic couples. The romance was built up nicely with much needed cuddling with Crow and steady pace..

• Auto-Immune Disease is represented. 

Crow lives with his Auto-Immune Disease throughout the book. It is never something that disappears. The presence of the infliction is worked into the magic system too. “The irony is, as a Deathchild with access to Deathmagic, I have the ability to heal…But I have limits--and convincing my immune system to stop attacking my joints all day and every day is one of them (16).  They wear gloves with numbing runes to help ease the discomfort. Instead of eliminating diseases and inflictions with magic, Novoa interprets them into the world. 

Weakness

No book is totally perfect. Here are a few points from the book that didn’t work for me. 

1. One of Crow’s partners in the polycule learned Crow’s secret between scenes and never spoke directly about it.

While the other two partners knew that Crow was a deathchild when they started dating, one did not. Crow didn’t tell that character before because they weren’t sure if the character could be trusted. Then, after they agreed to date, the conversation shifted to the tournament and the Shallows. Crow clearly wasn’t in a hurry to keep the character updated. Crow eventually talked openly in front of their partners about their anger on the deathchildren genocide, and then--the chapter ended (315)! This means the character learned Crow’s secret between scenes, robbing the audience of a scene where Crow shows they trust all their partners equally and the character shows love back. Instead, this one partner's moment was left out of the narrative.

2. The runes used for runemagic are not described. 

There are many runes used in the story and most go undescribed so the audience has to imagine what the runes look like. The best description the audience is given is on pages 227-228, “...whereas most runes can be made in one to three strokes each of these is six strokes long”. From the start, I wondered what the runes looked like. Were they like Norse runes or the runes from Cassandra Clare’s Shadowhunter series? Since runemagic was popular in the book, I wish there was more description of them. If describing them wouldn’t have worked with the flow of the story, perhaps a section in the back of the book could have listed them. 

Rating

The Bookworm's Snack rates 5 out of 5 stars!

I would recommend These Vengeful Gods! Its worldbuilding is fantastic. It weaves together future technology, magic, selfish and greedy gods, and a government overlooking its people. Crow is a wonderful hero who faces challenges from personal relationships to class discrimination in order to do what is right. A way this book could have improved was by avoiding skipping scenes where important information is given to a partner and describing the magic important to the story. Yet, this isn't a dealbreaker as the story is well written and exciting. I rate These Vengeful Gods five out of five stars. These Vengeful Gods sucked me into a world of magic and gods and love, and gave me a new perspective on how heroes have a right to vengeance!

Comment if you are looking forward to the book!