Review: The Chaos of Stars by Kiersten White

Title: The Chaos of Stars
Author: Kiersten White
Publisher: HarperTeen

Publication date: September 10, 2013

Genre(s): Young Adult (Greek Mythology)

Source: Publisher 

Format: ARC

Pages: 288

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Isadora’s family is seriously screwed up.

Of course, as the human daughter of Egyptian gods, that pretty much comes with the territory. She’s also stuck with parents who barely notice her, and a house full of relatives who can’t be bothered to remember her name. After all, they are going to be around forever—and she’s a mere mortal.

Isadora’s sick of living a life where she’s only worthy of a passing glance, and when she has the chance to move to San Diego with her brother, she jumps on it. But Isadora’s quickly finding that a “normal” life comes with plenty of its own epic complications—and that there’s no such thing as a clean break when it comes to family. Much as she wants to leave her past behind, she can’t shake the ominous dreams that foretell destruction for her entire family. When it turns out there may be truth in her nightmares, Isadora has to decide whether she can abandon her divine heritage after all.

The Chaos of Stars might sound like the usual mythology book, except it is egyptian mythology but is such an easy, breezy read with a great contemporary feel. I personally couldn't put it down and ended up finishing it very quickly. 

Usually in novels, I don't enjoy the various types of intros in the beginning of each chapter, whether it is a snippet of a poem, a quote, a flashback, or a short story within the actual story. However in The Chaos of Stars, the little intros introduce us and give us background information on all the egyptian gods. I personally never knew much about egyptian mythology, other than knowing who Isis is. However, The Chaos of Stars narrates little stories in such a fun way, through the voice of the main protagonist, Isadora, and you can't help but retain this information. When I went to The Metropolitan Museum of Arts in New York this August, I went into the Egyptian section and it was such a fun experience since I knew about all the gods that were mentioned which were on the cards accompanying the artifacts and art pieces there. 

Going back to the novel, I think Isadora is a very unique female protagonist. She does have her insecurities with her family, since she is the offspring of two gods who have a child every 20 years just to keep the praying and glorification to them going. But other than that, I felt she was a very mature and independent girl. She never really had insecurities with her looks, guys, or 'finding herself'. After introductions for the novel, Isadora moves to California where she starts working at a museum as well as make friends and meet an intriguing boy *oh la la*. Yes, there is the egyptian mythology but it isn't suffocatingly only revolving around that. I personally loved all the characters. They were laid back, and the plot itself was great and I definitely recommend it to all YA readers.  

        Other books by Kiersten White:

        Mind Games (Mind Games, #1)

        Paranormalcy (Paranormalcy, #1)