This could have been a 4 or 5 star story… with an editor’s help. In the process she interacts quite a bit with Hades and others in the Underworld. The story that follows is Persephone trying to figure out how to create life in the Underworld when she has no powers of her own. And unlike in the myth, Persephone can come and go from the Underworld as she pleases, until the deal ends in 6 months. The terms of the deal are made the next morning. And Persephone doesn’t realize anything is wrong until she goes home and realizes he’s marked her wrist. Hades does not make himself known throughout the entire exchange. One of the big reasons is that I’m not quite sure how a deal was struck? She lost to him playing poker where they stakes were whoever won could ask a question of the other. Unfortunately, this is where the story starts to falter.

She must make life in the Underworld, or live there eternally. When she asks Hades to teach her how to play poker, she lands herself in a deal with him. Persephone meets Hades without knowing it when she attends one of his clubs with a friend.

The descriptions just made me want to live in that world. Her comparisons of the Upper World to the Under World were thought provoking and interesting. And I loved her descriptions of the Underworld. The city of New Athens, the ways the gods connected with humans through business ventures. What I really loved about the story was the world that St. Hades and Zeus agree to allow Persephone to return for 6 months each year, but she must always return to the Underworld.Ī Touch of Darkness reads a bit differently. Her mother, Demeter, begs Hades to allow Persephone to return to the land of the living. While she is there, she eats 4 pomegranate seeds which ties her to her captor, Hades.

In the myth, Hades falls in love with Persephone and traps her in the Underworld. Clair is a retelling of the myth of Hades and Persephone.

A touch of darkness scarlett st clair