Review+Giveaway: My Best Friend Athena by Dana Hammer

Goddess Fish book tour banner for My Best Friend Athena — Click the banner to follow the tour

Review of middle grade fantasy My Best Friend Athena by Dana Hammer

cover of My Best Friend Athena by Dana Hammer

Fanny Fitzpatrick has the coolest best friend ever. Athena is smart, and pretty, and brave, and kind. Fanny loves her friend, but sometimes, she feels a little jealous of how perfect Athena is.

But even “perfect” girls make mistakes, and Athena makes a big one when she accidentally turns the school bully into a cockroach. He was picking on their friend Gemma and Athena lost her temper and her magic powers just slipped out right in front of Fanny.

Now Fanny knows that Athena isn’t an ordinary girl – she’s the reincarnation of a Greek goddess, powers and all – and now she needs Fanny and Gemma’s help to hunt down the bully-turned-cockroach and turn him back into a human boy.

Fanny doesn’t want to spend all her time looking for a cockroach. She’s got the Junior Miss Super Pretty Pageant to prepare for, if she can get over her stage fright. Besides, Athena’s Dad, Zeus, has forbidden the girls from meddling with any more cockroaches or magic, and Zeus is a god you don’t want to mess with.

Fanny has to make a choice. Should she pursue her pageant dreams, or risk Zeus’ wrath to find the cockroach-boy? What’s the right thing to do? And how do you hunt down a cockroach anyway?

This post contains affiliate links. View the full disclosure here.

Excerpt from My Best Friend Athena

Normally, when I arrive at school, I’m tired and cold and grumpy, but not today! Because today I’ve got the World’s Coolest Necklace, and everyone’s gonna notice it and give me compliments. It’s a “statement” necklace, and I got it at an old lady’s estate sale yesterday. I was shopping with my best friend, Athena, when I saw it. It was sitting on a dresser, with a bunch of other jewellery, but this necklace was the only one that caught my eye. It’s a large octopus, with jewel-covered tentacles, and two pearls for eyes. I tried it on, and it looked like the tentacles were reaching around my neck, trying to choke me. I’d never seen anything so cool in my life. It was $20, which was more than I had, but luckily Athena was there, and she bought it for me. Athena always has lots of money, because she’s a rich kid, but that’s NOT why I’m friends with her.

Anyway, she saw how sad I was that I couldn’t afford the necklace and she just bought it for me, probably because she has excellent taste and could see what a great investment it would be. She said it was “quirky” and “an interesting piece,” which I happen to know is code for “high fashion”.

My mom said it was “tacky garbage” but she doesn’t know about fashion. She mostly wears gym clothes, even when she’s not at the gym, and she never wears jewelry, except her wedding ring.

Review of My Best Friend Athena

This was adorable from start to finish. I’m a sucker for anything even vaguely involving mythology, and middle grade with mythology is my happy place. This take on Zeus and Athena captured my attention while leaving me wondering if there would be sequels with the other Greek gods. The narration was perfect for the age of the characters—just enough of following thoughts to far-fetched conclusions to remind me of my middle school days but not too much that it felt overwhelming.

Though this was just cute, it tackled some big topics in a solid, sensitive way. I appreciated the different views on bullying (especially how being a bigger bully isn’t the correct response to being bullied), and without spoiling, the differing opinions of what went on through the bulk of the story led to some truly awesome conflict in terms of how people react to the truth. It’s hard to talk about it without giving away the ending, so trust me when I say the exploration and emotions were just handled very well.

All in all, highly recommend this to adults and children alike. I’d love to see more from these characters, and whether it features them or not, I’m excited to see what else Hammer’s got.

About Dana Hammer

Dana Hammer is a novelist, screenwriter and playwright. She has won over forty awards and honors for her writing, few of which generated income, all of which were deeply appreciated. She is not a cannibal, but she is the author of A Cannibals Guide to Fasting. Dana is also the author of middle grade fantasy My Best Friend Athena which was inspired by a desire to write something her 9 year old daughter could read.