The Goddess Girls is a series of children's books written by Joan Holub and Suzanne Williams, published by Simon & Schuster under the Aladdin imprint. The books are based on Greek mythology and depict the younger generation of the Olympian pantheon as privileged tween students attending Mount Olympus Academy (MOA) to develop their divine skills.
The series focuses on four primary characters – Athena, Persephone, Aphrodite, and Artemis — as a diverse group of loyal friends. Athena is noted for her intelligence, Persephone is mysterious and kind, Artemis is bold and strong, and Aphrodite is "effortlessly beautiful". Holub writes about Athena and Artemis, and Williams about Persephone and Aphrodite.
Zeus is represented as the principal of the academy, and many other gods, including Hades, Poseidon, and Ares, appear in the series. Pandora, Medusa and Heracles appear as mortal characters.
The series includes deities and characters from other mythological traditions as visitors to the academy.
Titles Number Title ISBN Date of publication 1 Athena the Brain April 6, 2010 2 Persephone the Phony April 12, 2010 3 Aphrodite the Beauty April 12, 2010 4 Artemis the Brave December 7, 2010 5 Athena the Wise April 5, 2011 6 Aphrodite the Diva August 12, 2011 7 Artemis the Loyal December 6, 2011 8 Medusa the Mean April 3, 2012 Special The Girl Games July 10, 2012 9 Pandora the Curious December 4, 2012 10 Pheme the Gossip April 12, 2013 11 Persephone the Daring August 6, 2013 12 Cassandra the Lucky December 3, 2013 13 Athena the Proud April 5, 2014 14 Iris the Colorful August 5, 2014 15 Aphrodite the Fair December 2, 2014 16 Medusa the Rich April 28, 2015 17 Amphitrite the Bubbly August 18, 2015 18 Hestia the Invisible December 1, 2015 19 Echo the Copycat April 26, 2016 20 Calliope the Muse August 9, 2016 21 Pallas the Pal December 6, 2016 22 Nyx the Mysterious April 4, 2017 23 Medea the Enchantress December 5, 2017 24 Eos the Lighthearted December 4, 2018 25 Clotho the Fate December 3, 2019 26 Persephone the Grateful December 1, 2020 27 Hecate the Witch November 30, 2021 28 Artemis the Hero December 6, 2022 29 Elpis the Hopeful December 5, 2023 Special Time Travelers September 10, 2024
Characters The Goddess Girls Athena is at the beginning of the series a brainy and seemingly mortal girl who has never quite fitted in at her junior high school. Raised on Earth, Athena has a happy, wonderful life with her parents and stepsister Pallas, who is also her best friend. She eventually discovers her father is Zeus, King of the Gods and Ruler of the Heavens. She then transfers to Mount Olympus Academy, where she becomes one of its top students. In Aphrodite the Diva Aphrodite finds Zeus a new wife, Hera, who becomes Athena's new stepmother. Athena has wavy brown hair and gray eyes, and she usually wears a blue chiton. She often doesn't worry about her looks and can be completely clueless about romance, but she is particularly beautiful. Athena soon makes friends with the most popular girls at school – Persephone, Aphrodite, and Artemis. She is the youngest of the Goddess Girls but is the smartest girl in the academy and always makes "A"s. She can shapeshift and loves owls, her favorite animal. Athena becomes the goddess girl of wisdom due to her intelligence and good judgment. In Athena the Wise she develops a crush on Heracles, a strong mortal who transfers to the Academy. Persephone, the daughter of Demeter, the goddess of fertility, flowers, and spring, loves flowers and can make them grow with a single touch of her finger. Persephone is a very beautiful, kind-hearted goddess girl, as well as extremely considerate and understanding. She has pale skin and frizzy red hair, and often wears a yellow chiton. Her mother encourages her to "go along to get along", but when she meets and falls in love with a boy named Hades, she begins to live by her own opinions, instead of just following others. Persephone helps sort things out and is very calm. She eventually becomes a dog-lover because of Cerberus, a three-headed dog in the Underworld owned by her boyfriend Hades. In Persephone the Daring, she has her first kiss with Hades. In The Girl Games she realizes she also loves cats, when Aphrodite finds a stray cat in the girls' local mall, the "Immortal Marketplace". Aphrodite, the goddess of love and beauty and one of the most popular girls at school, is obsessed with her looks. She has long, curly blond hair, blue eyes, a slender, graceful figure and usually wears make-up. She wears many different colors of chitons, but often wears pink ones. She loves matchmaking mortals and helping mortals in love. In Aphrodite the Diva she makes a Lonely Hearts Club, a club to help mortals in love, to raise her grades. Not surprisingly, her beauty attracts a lot of attention, especially from god boys. She has an on-and-off relationship with Ares, occasionally arguing with him, though they always make up. Aphrodite has no parents, having sprouted from seafoam. Artemis loves animals and sports. She is the best archer at Mount Olympus Academy, along with her twin brother, Apollo. She is best friends with Aphrodite, Persephone, and Athena. Artemis cares nothing for fashion and is the goddess girl of the moon and the hunt. She wears a short red chiton, is dark skinned, and always carries her bow and her silver arrows. She has three dogs, Amby, Nectar, and Suez, and four white deer who pull her chariot. In Artemis the Brave, Artemis has her first crush, on Orion, but later realizes that he only cares about himself. In The Girl Games, Actaeon kisses her on the cheek. Artemis also has a psychic connection with Apollo as shown in Artemis the Loyal.
Recurring characters Godboys Apollo is the god boy of truth and prophecies. He is Artemis's twin brother and, like her, is athletic and skilled at archery. He is part of a band called Heavens Above. He appears in Artemis the Brave and Artemis the Loyal, where he argues with Artemis. In Cassandra the Lucky, Apollo develops a crush on Cassandra after cursing her. Ares is the god boy of war and is the academy's fastest runner. He is tall, particularly muscular, and the cutest god boy in MOA according to Aphrodite. In Aphrodite the Beauty, Aphrodite becomes jealous because he pays attention to Athena. In Aphrodite the Diva he writes a song for Aphrodite. He is in the band Heavens Above with Dionysus, Poseidon, and Apollo. He and Aphrodite sometimes argue, but they are deeply in love and hope one day to get married. In The Girl Games he helps her to run faster. Dionysus is the god boy of wine. Dionysus appears in the eighth book Medusa the Mean. Medusa is Dionysus's crush, despite their differences. Poseidon is the god boy of the sea. He always carries a trident around and is always dripping wet, like he just got done swimming. He is one of the popular god boys. Medusa likes Poseidon in the beginning but finds out he is mean and selfish. Pandora likes him too, but in Pandora the Curious, she likes Epimetheus, the Titan boy. In Amphitrite the Bubbly it is revealed that Poseidon just wants to make great achievements like his friends. Poseidon has a crush on Amphitrite. Hades is the god boy of death and first appears in Persephone the Phony. He is dark, gloomy, handsome, and he did not like to talk a lot until he met Persephone. She is the first one to judge him by his character and not the fact that he is from the Underworld. As a result, they eventually fall in love with each other. In The Girl Games, he coaches Persephone for the long jump. Hades has a three-headed dog named Cerberus in the Underworld. Also in Persephone the Daring he stands in for Poseidon on the drums in Heavens Above, and he also has his very first kiss with Persephone, officially making them boyfriend and girlfriend. Hephaestus is the god boy of metalworking. He first appears in Aphrodite the Beauty. He is scrawny, clumsy, and lame in both legs. Aphrodite doesn't like his looks but she thinks that he has "inner beauty". He has a crush on Aphrodite at first and gives her beautiful roses, but later in the series he wins the heart of another beautiful goddess girl named Aglaia, who is deeply in love with Hephaestus.
Mortals Orion is a mortal that appeared in book 4 "Artemis the brave", and he was self-centered and acted nice to make Artemis like him. Medusa is originally the "mean girl" at Mount Olympus Academy, but she proves that she is really just misunderstood. In the first seven books, she is the archenemy of the four most popular goddess girls at the academy. She is famous for her stoneifying gaze, which was accidentally caused by one of Athena's inventions. Snarkypoo, or as Athena misspelled it, Snakeypoo, dripped in Medusa's eyes when she was showering and ended up making her gaze able to turn mortals into stone. Snarkypoo was originally made to turn snarky words into stone. Medusa has two twin immortal sisters, Stheno and Euryale. They are goddess girls in her family, but Medusa is mortal. In Medusa the Mean, the real part of Medusa is exposed, as she actually wants an immortality and popularity. One of her big secrets is that she actually has to study extremely hard to keep up. In Medusa the Mean she gets to be immortal for one day because of her "present" to Principal Zeus's wedding. Not many mortals get to go to MOA but her sisters sneaked her in, and when Zeus found out he let her stay. In the early books, Medusa had a crush on Poseidon, but she later realizes that another god boy, Dionysus, really likes her and soon she developed romantic feelings for him. In Greek mythology, the three Gorgon sisters—Medusa, Stheno, and Euryale—were all children of the ancient marine deities Phorcys (or Phorkys) and his sister Ceto (or Keto), chthonic monsters from an archaic world. In the Goddess Girls series, Ceto and Phorcys are mentioned as a sea monster and sea hog. Pandora is a mortal girl who is very curious. She used to have a crush on Poseidon, but then crushes on Epimetheus in Pandora the Curious. Her friends are Athena, Medusa and Pheme. As a symbol of her great curiosity, her blue-and-gold streaked bangs are in the shape of a question mark, they are also the school colors which shows that she has school spirit. She is very nice, but it is very hard for the other goddess girls to actually have a conversation with her because of her lack of attention. When she talks to them she just keeps on asking questions without giving them a chance to answer. Heracles first appears in the fifth book of the series, Athena the Wise. He is described as a mortal boy with dark, curly hair, wears a lion-skin cape, and carries a big club with him. Aphrodite made cutting comments about the cape, but Heracles's friends think it is cool. In the book Athena the Wise, Heracles must complete 12 labors in one week or else he is expelled . The principal secretly asks his daughter Athena to watch over Heracles, and they develop a crush on each other. Actaeon is mentioned at the end of the book Artemis the Brave and in Artemis the Loyal, where he plays a minor role. He is friends with Apollo, who thinks that Actaeon likes Artemis. In The Girl Games he shows interest in Penthe, a mortal Amazon girl competing against Artemis in the games. Artemis becomes jealous but in the end, Penthe and Artemis become friends. He later kisses Artemis which proves that he has a crush on Artemis. Cassandra first appears as a bridesmaid at Hera's and Zeus's wedding. She used to be a princess in Troy. In Cassandra the Lucky, she is angry with Athena, Aphrodite and Apollo for starting the Trojan War. Like Apollo, she can tell fortunes—but no one believes her predictions. She later develops a crush on Apollo. Ariadne is the princess of Crete and daughter of King Minos. She first appears in Medusa the Mean as Dionysus' first bridesmaid.