Sweet Venom by Tera Lynn Childs

The Synopsis:
Grace just moved to San Francisco and is excited to start over at a new school. The change is full of fresh possibilities, but it’s also a tiny bit scary. It gets scarier when a minotaur walks in the door. And even more shocking when a girl who looks just like her shows up to fight the monster.
Gretchen is tired of monsters pulling her out into the wee hours, especially on a school night, but what can she do? Sending the minotaur back to his bleak home is just another notch on her combat belt. She never expected to run into this girl who could be her double, though.
Greer has her life pretty well put together, thank you very much. But that all tilts sideways when two girls who look eerily like her appear on her doorstep and claim they're triplets, supernatural descendants of some hideous creature from Greek myth, destined to spend their lives hunting monsters.
These three teenage descendants of Medusa, the once-beautiful gorgon maligned by myth, must reunite and embrace their fates in this unique paranormal world where monsters lurk in plain sight.
My Thoughts:
Being that I have a deep love for all things free and cheap, I jumped on the opportunity to download Sweet Venom after seeing it proudly advertised on Pitch Dark as free a few weeks ago.  Never mind that I loathe reading anything on technological devices.  Ironic, since I run a blog here and read other peoples' reviews all the time.  Call me a hypocrite.

I had downloaded it onto my phone, and I just expected that I'd pick it up and read it whenever I got bored and didn't have my current read on me.  At first, that's just what I did.  I think that lasted for only a day or two before I had a hard time putting it down.  I didn't have high expectations for this book because I'd never read up on it or anything, so I was happily surprised to become wrapped up into the story.

I was so surprised that I didn't even know there was a third sister to the group.  I'd read nothing of the synopsis!  It's so unlike me!
After getting acquainted with all three sisters, I found that I mostly connected with Gretchen and Grace, Gretchen being my favorite.  Gretchen was all badass ninja-like as she takes down Greek monster after Greek monster.  This is a regular walk-in-the-park life for Gretchen.  She was also pessimistic and untrustworthy, which made me like her even more.  And she named her car.  So when two other sisters stumble into her now not so walk-in-the-park life, she was believable with her reactions.

Grace was cute.  She had that very girl-next-door vibe, but I found her to be naive at times and too trusting and optimistic.  Too much sunshine for me.  But that's what made her her, so I can't complain much about that.  I did, however, like how she tried her best to keep the trio together.  She was fiercely determined and stubborn and knowledgeable.

And then there was Greer.  I'm not going to say much other than I didn't like her.  We did not have that connecting moment, but that could also be due to how little 'screen time'--if you will--she got during the book.  And I was not convinced about her by the end of the book.

Since I love Greek mythology so much, I thought it was really interesting to read where Medusa happens to be the good guy.  It was a different and original take on my beloved Greek mythology and I did enjoy it to the point that I couldn't wait to get my hands on the second book (this time in HB form, thank you).  There was action and the budding romance between some of the characters was extremely adorable.  Unfortunately, there were times in the story where I'd get confused about who I was reading about.  Maybe it's because all of their names began with a 'G' or the writing style got a little too consistent between characters.  I'm not sure.

Sweet Venom was an original tale that tells the story of three sisters destined to kick Greek monster butt while being sassy and fierce as they do so.  I was happily wrapped up into the story and was gladly transported to the sunny streets of San Fransisco, California.  And although Childs transports readers into the dark alleyways of the city and introduces them to the not-so-attractive monsters, Sweet Venom was a short and entertaining read with dimensional characters and great imagery.  If you're into Greek mythology or if you even like some monster butt-kicking, Sweet Venom would be a great read  for you.