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Skies of Olympus by Eliza Raine - Book Tour + Giveaway

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Skies of Olympus
Eliza Raine
(Skies of Olympus, #1)
Publication date: May 11th 2019
Genres: Fantasy, Mythology, Young Adult
Twelve deadly Trials. A race for immortality. Her last chance for revenge.
Olympus is a beautiful but dangerous place, controlled by twelve Gods wielding unlimited power. Now they have devised the ultimate entertainment; a chance for their favourites to compete in twelve trials to win the ultimate prize – immortality.
Lyssa didn’t think the Gods knew who she was, until she was chosen to try out for the Trials with the crew of her old but beloved smugglers ship, the Alastor. For her the Trials are about much more than an eternal life. They’re about stopping the monster from her past gaining the one thing that would put her revenge out of reach forever. Can she face her murderous father and stop him from becoming immortal?
Join Lyssa and her crew alongside giants, centaurs, satyrs and Gods in the first of twelve episodes of this brand new YA Fantasy retelling. This is Greek mythology like you’ve never read before.

Guest Post
My favourite Greek myth is definitely Eros and Psyche. It’s one few love stories in the classical myths that actually ends happily! So many stories, fairytales, modern folklore and even contemporary movies have drawn inspiration from the Greek myths – they’re so full of ideas! This story encompasses so many cool things, castles in the sky, beautiful winged men, wrathful gods, dragon guarded rivers, and of course, true love.
Eros and Psyche
Psyche is the youngest daughter of a king and queen and is so beautiful that the kingdom begins to worship her instead of Aphrodite. The goddess of love, being prone to jealousy, asks her son Eros (cupid in Roman myth) to shoot her with his arrow so that she falls in love with something hideous. Eros accidentally grazes himself with the arrow though and falls deeply in love with Psyche.
Her parents suspect that they have angered Aphrodite and visit the oracle to find out what to do. They are told to sacrifice Psyche in a marriage/funeral at the top of a cliff. Zephyr, the west wind, catches her though and carries her up to a beautiful castle in the sky. There’s nobody in the castle but all of the furniture is magic and a feast serves itself to her whilst music is played (Beauty and the Beast, anyone?) She allows herself to be taken to a bedroom, where an invisible man comes and makes her his wife. She falls in love with him, despite never being allowed to see his face.
Eventually, Psyche convinces Eros to let her sisters visit her. They become jealous when they see the castle and convince her that she is sleeping with a monster and that she should see what he looks like. So after he has fallen asleep one night she lights an oil lamp. She’s so startled by how beautiful the winged man in the bed is that she spills hot oil on his wings. In pain and angry, he flees.
Psyche visits her two sisters, telling them that her husband was Eros and that now that he no longer loved her, they should try to win him. They both jump off the same cliff that they sacrificed her to, but the wind fails to catch them and they fall to their deaths (Cinderella’s jealous step-sisters, anyone?)
Psyche then wanders the earth, looking for her lost love. She offers herself to Aphrodite, who has her beaten and tortured by her handmaids, Worry and Sadness, then tells her to sort beans and lentils into organised heaps while she goes to a feast. It ‘s an impossible task but an ant decides to help her. A drunk Aphrodite is furious when she returns and tells Psyche to cross a river to get golden wool from viscous sheep. Psyche tries to drown herself in the river but the reeds save her and tell her to collect the wool from where it has caught on bushes. Aphrodite then tells Psyche to collect black water from the source of the river Styx, which is at the top of a cliff guarded by dragons. She falls off the cliff but Zeus takes pity on her and sends his eagle to fight the dragons and rescue her.
Her last task is to go the underworld and collect a dose of Persephone’s beauty in a box, as Aphrodite says her own has faded since tending to her wounded son. Psyche tries to jump off a tower instead, but the tower tells her how to get into the underworld and to take cakes to distract the three-headed guard dog Cerberus, and coins for Charon, the ferryman. She does everything she’s told but when she leaves the underworld, she opens the box to see the beauty. Instead she releases a deep, eternal sleep (Sleeping Beauty, anyone?).
At this point, Eros escapes from his mothers house, his wing healed, and flies until he finds Psyche. He lifts the sleep from her with an arrow of love, then begs for Zeus’s help. Zeus agrees to make Aphrodite end her vendetta and gives Psyche Ambrosia to drink, which makes her immortal. The two are married in a ceremony on Olympus. 

Author Bio:
Eliza Raine lives near Reading in England with her husband, three cats and outrageously cute puppy. She has a BA Hons in History and has a deep-rooted passion for all types of mythology and stories about women who don’t need rescuing.

She can usually be found reading fairytale retellings, playing board games or binge-watching Netflix shows.

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