Goddess of the river is a vivid retelling of the story of Ganga, the river goddess and her mortal son. Ganga is a river diety and mother to the godlings that roam her shores until one day when she is cursed into mortal form by a vengeful sage. Unable to return to river until she fulfils the obligations of the curse, she finds she must birth all of the godlings she had in her care into human forms.

When King Shantanu happens upon her shores, he is immediately entranced and wishes to make her his wife. We follow as Ganga learns to navigate this new life and together her and the King have a son, Prince Devavrata. He oaths to never take his father’s throne however his actions unfortunately lead them into war.

I am unfamiliar with this particular mythology however it did not take away any of my enjoyment when reading this story. I’m sure it’s even more of a joy to read for people who do know the myth. I was blown away by the depths of this story. It touches on the consequences of our actions in the long term and family bonds as well as duty and the value we place upon life. Even with topics such as this, the book doesn’t feel boring or slow at any point.

It was interesting to get more of Bhishma’s (Devavrata) POV later on in the story. I enjoyed seeing his thoughts on war and seeing his transition from child to adulthood even if I did find him frustrating. I feel like that just means the author did a great job with his character.

Ganga is particularly fascinating to me as her story is heartbreaking as we see her fall so far from who she used to be. Her view on humanity shifts so much as well as her own view of her purpose in the world and it was just so well done.

The beginning of this story was particularly enjoyable to me as we got to see Ganga navigate her new life and her unfamiliarity with humankind. My only gripe is that I did get a little lost in the middle as I found it hard to keep track of the politics and all the characters. Therefore the middle to end of this book felt a little bogged down due to me getting confused with keeping track of who’s who. I think overall, the author did a beautiful job with this book and it definitely left me deep in thought.

3.5 stars

Overall, I quite enjoyed "Goddess of the River", but I definitely liked "Kaikeyi" better.
Especially the second half of the novel introduced a lot of characters without really giving them any depth of character or development, so it was difficult for me to really get invested in their story.

I was given an ARC of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you very much!

Sometimes books can give you a hard time while still being incredibly good. I must admit, perhaps I didn't take enough time with this - I devoured this, with the writing being so beautiful, when maybe I should have slowed down and truly sat with the story for a bit before continuing.

Goddess of the River is a retelling of the epic Mahabharata through the focus of the Goddess Ganga. Ganga herself was a lovely character, strong yet gentle, and through the story, made several hard choices that truly, no being, god or mortal, should ever have to make. I confess, I knew nothing of the Mahabharata before starting this book, and I believe that at least being familiar with it would have made understanding and reading much easier. As such, I ended up being terribly confused at all the names and characters, and it took me too much time altogether to cobble together the family tree (at least until I found out that the author made a family tree herself, just for this purpose: https://vaishnavipatel.com/elementor-1255/).
However, Patel's writing style is truly exceptional. The prose flowed like water, and I found the pages slipping past between my fingers. I greatly, greatly enjoyed this book, despite my confusion. I can only recommend this to anyone, but if you do: keep that family tree close.

Ganga, the goddess of the river, is made mortal and cursed to bear the seven Vasus - the godlings, be their mother, to free them back into their ethereal forms.
She catches the eye of the powerful and greedy Shantanu, raja of Hastinapur, and sets off a course of events that has far reaching consequences in the Mahabharata.

Bhishma is the final godling, the one who survived to grow up in his mortal form, yet to avoid bloodshed, took a vow and renounced the throne.

Bhishma is an extremely frustrating character and Patel captures this perfectly.
He appears noble and loyal for honouring his vows above all else, but we can see how this steadfastness ends up causing more harm and chaos. This is even more grievous when you realise he’s fighting for a side he doesn’t believe in just to uphold his promise.

So he stayed alive to fight as humanely as possible, although that was a paradox.

Patel captures motherhood beautifully just like in her debut of Kaikeyi. Especially coming from the point of view of a goddess who is initially so removed from humanity and her emotions.

”Do a person's wishes matter?" Karna asked. "Or is it their actions on which they should be judged?"

Whilst there were a lot of names and the family intricacies become quickly confusing and easily muddled up, I was mostly able to follow along. It helped that the main players in this story are identified and revisited. I don’t think this is a criticism of Patel, as this merely reflects the sprawling complexity of the Mahabharata.

I admit to preferring Kaikeyi as the prose was more thoughtful and touching. However, I must applaud Patel on rewriting the Mahabharata to focus on forgotten characters to provide a unique and compelling narrative.

Thank you to Orbit for providing an arc in exchange for a review!

The Mahabharatha is the longest epic poem in the world and having to condense this entire story into a 400 to 500 pages book is in itself a great feat.

Told through the perspectives of Ganga and Bhisma respectively, this book deals with themes of dharma, righteousness, and most importantly, the choices made and the consequences of those choices.

The first part of this book with Ganga as a mortal queen was a solid 5 star. Afterwhich, Bhisma's storyline took centerstage, but, I loved how the author kept Ganga's perspectives relevant throughout the book. The mother- son relationship was done exceptionally well. They keep coming together at various junction of time and every conversation they have is very insightful.

I would like to point out that the introduction of so many new characters with so many different side stories was done well. Theres a lot of new information in a very short amount of time but it never bogged down the story for me. However, i realise that this is a very subjective opinion as I am someone who is intimately familiar with the story of Mahabharatha.

My only true gripe is that because of the narrative choice, some of the key events of that led to the war didn't feel very impactful. For example, the dice game and the eventual disrobing of Draupadi is one of the foremost factors for the Pandavas going to war but because we see these events from Bhisma's eyes, it felt a bit flat and failed to evoke the same amount of outrage and emotions that I have previously felt while experiencing this story via other mediums.

That being said, this is Ganga's and her son story to the core and I truly felt that the author did their characters incredible justice. Looking forward to what she does next!

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the review copy. The writing in this is beautiful, and I enjoyed part 1 very much. However, from part 2 the story featured a great manner of characters which were not introduced in detail and so I found it hard to follow who was who at multiple points. Some sort of family tree or list of characters would have been helpful. There were also some time jumps which I found confusing sometimes. I would recommend this for those that like mythology retellings especially if you are looking for something beyond the typical Greek mythology.

Thank you so very much to Netgalley and the publisher/author for accepting my request to read and review this book before its release date!

I adore the recent "fictionalized mythology" books being released more often these days, however, I have been finding that most are Greek mythological retellings. I was thrilled to find out this book was based of Hindu mythology for a change!

I adored learning more about Hindu Mythology and specifically Ganga the Goddess of the River. Reading from the perspective of an entity of water was such a unique way of storytelling and I found myself utterly engrossed from the get-go.

The first third of this book had me absolutely hooked. There was a dark scene that shook me but I understand its relevance. Ganga is cursed to become mortal, bound to the form of a woman who catches the eye of the King. In this, she misses her Godly form greatly, but when she returns to her true form a third of the way in, she finds she has retained some of these human feelings. Her son, prince Devavrata, then becomes a second main character.

I'll be honest, once Devavrata grows up and we started seeing his perspective I wasn't as in love with the story anymore. I felt like the rhythm of the book was lost a little bit and I was overwhelmed very quickly by TENS of names and character introduced so quickly, alongside a very different and tumultuous political landscape.

But, the writing in this book is stunning, and I really appreciated how unique the story was, as someone who has never read about Hindu mythology before. I will definitely be reading more from this author.

First of all, a big thank you to Orbit UK and Netgalley for approving me of an ARC of Goddess of the River! Kaikeyi was one of my favorite books of 2022 and because of this, I was highly anticipating Vaishnavi's second book.

Ganga is a familiar name and entity to me as her name is occasionally mentioned in religious contexts through out my life - so I was so excited to read this one. Despite being familiar with both the Mahabharata and Ganga individually, I have always known them as separate entities/concept (I recognize that this is my fault - I didn't have much interest during religion classes and I wasn't really taught much about them). Therefore, encountering a narrative that intertwines the two was particularly intriguing for me.

Much like her writing in Kaikeyi, I also really enjoyed Vaishnavi's writing. It reads much like a folk/fairy tale though so if you're thinking of reading this one, please take note of that beforehand. This book just feels like Ganga trying to narrate through her life story and in a way it kind of feels soothing. One thing that I wasn't expecting though was that unlike Kaikeyi where we truly focus on her story, Goddess of the River follows a few other characters and although we are narrated by Ganga only, it's not solely HER story that we are reading. This kind of bums me a little bit if I'm being completely honest but I think that these plots are needed to support Ganga's story and messages. I also really enjoyed the message behind this book about righteousness and loyalty, and I especially liked the discussion about "vows before dharma".

The pacing of this book for me was much slower than Kaikeyi and I think that's why I couldn't fully enjoy this one and give it a perfect rating. However, this book definitely motivated me to learn more about the goddess and about the story itself and I really appreciate all the research that Vaishnavi has done to write an accessible reimagining like this.

Huge thanks to Little, Brown Book Group UK and NetGalley for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
Rating:5/5
This was wonderful! After Greek mythology retellings being so overdone these days, reading Goddess of the River felt beautifully refreshing. Especially because I grew up listening to stories from the Mahabharata and it's very close to my heart.

Goddess of the River is a gorgeous retelling of the Mahabharata from the perspective of two complex characters and somehow manages to narrate the enormous epic within 400 pages without making it feels rushed. It is told in four parts (named after various parts of the river Ganga) with the first part focusing solely on Ganga and the other three alternating between her and Bhishma's POV. After reading this, I realised how overlooked Ganga is in the Mahabharata. After all, it's her with whom it all began. I was invested in her POV more than I was in Bhishma's. Her character development from being tempestuous and disdainful of mortals to being compassionate and being like a mother to them all was beautiful to read. Motherhood is a prevalent theme in the book. The ending was beautiful and the last line remained with me even as I turned the last page.

I found this book to be more compelling than Kaikeyi. While Patel's debut was a disappointment, this was absolutely stunning. The prose is gorgeous and carries the story well. I'd highly recommend this book to all mythology lovers, especially if like me, you're feeling up with Greek mythology retellings!