Venus Envy by EM Lynley

[reviews_and_ramblings]

When I was young there was a cartoon here in Italy that I liked very much. It was about an ipothetical daughter of Apollo, god of Sun, Pollon, and it was Japanese I believe. It arrived in Italy after passing through the censorship and actually very few of the original cartoon survived; I say so since, from what remained, you could understand that the main idea was that all the Olympic gods were highly sexually driven men and women, who practically have sex with everyone (and sometime everything!) was around. Their actual roles were always forgotten and you had to wonder how the human world could function if its gods were like that!

From this childish memory, it remains to me a passion for all the related stories about Gods and similar deity, and I enjoy, here and there, a story that mix ancient legends with modern time (see Fantasy Lover by Sherrilyn Kenion).

Venus Envy is something similar to that cartoon, it's setting in Rome instead of Mount Olympus, but basically the gods are the same. Venus in particular, and that is right with her role, thinks to herself like a gift for everyman, and when she is rebuffed by Sancus, god of honesty, she doesn't think twince to curse him with the help of her son Cupid. Now Sancus seems unable to desire, and have sex, with everyone he loves, but has an uncontrollable urge to have sex with evey man he crosses on the street. Being Sancus a good god, with actually a moral, he doesn't find the situation very appealing, even less when he falls in love for Aurelio, a nice man he met one night and is unable to "satisfy" the morning after.

This is only a short novella, so there is nothing much to say. I like one thing in particular, something that is often taught to us in school: in the common imaginary, the Greek gods, and their correspondent Roman version, are always seen as debauched and unstable, always ready to "party" and easy to be enraged, and so also vindictive; the "original" Roman gods instead, always represent something useful and "ordinary", they are more near to the human world than their Greek colleagues, and seems to care more for down to heart things, like jobs and homes and everything related. This is fully respected by this novella, where Venus is a bitch in heat and instead Sancus is more like a library mouse who finds himself in a very embarrassing situation for him.

http://www.cobblestone-press.com/catalog/books/venusenvy.htm

The Rainbow Awards: Phase 2: http://elisa-rolle.livejournal.com/823682.html

Comments

[elisa-rolle.livejournal.com]

Mi sa che siamo più o meno della stessa generazione allora ;-) Elisa