Publisher Description

Calliope, the muse of epic poetry, has trouble putting her bright and fun ideas into action in this twentieth Goddess girls adventure! Ever since she inspired Homer to write his epic works, Calliope feels like she has a lot to live up to! It doesn't help that, despite her success, she always feels like she is in the shadows of her older, mega-talented sisters. When Calliope is invited to Mount Olympus Academy, she knows this is her chance to prove to everyone what she's made of. But after struggling to come up with the perfect idea for her first big school project, Calliope decides she needs a roomie to help keep her on task and study, just like her sisters did for her back home. There's just one problem: everyone already seems to be paired up. Can Calliope find her own inspiration, the perfect roommate, and her own spotlight at MOA?

Author Biography

Joan Holub has authored and/or illustrated over 140 children's books, including the Goddess Girls series, the Heroes in Training series, the New York Times bestselling picture book Mighty Dads (illustrated by James Dean), and Little Red Writing (illustrated by Melissa Sweet). She lives in North Carolina and is online at JoanHolub.com. Suzanne Williams is a former elementary school librarian and the author of over seventy books for children, including the award-winning picture books Library Lil (illustrated by Steven Kellogg) and My Dog Never Says Please (illustrated by Tedd Arnold), and several chapter book and middle grade series. She also coauthors the Goddess Girls and Thunder Girls series with the fantastic Joan Holub. Visit her at Suzanne-Williams.com.

Excerpt from Book

Calliope the Muse 1 Architecture-ology Blues One and a half weeks later . . . TELVE-YEAR-OLD CALLIOPE HAD JUST TAKEN her seat in her last-period Architecture-ology class on Friday afternoon when she heard a sound. "Psst!" She glanced over at Medusa, the green-skinned, snaky-haired mortal girl whose desk was next to hers. Was Medusa trying to get her attention? Or had her snakes simply been hissing? This puzzle was solved when Medusa leaned her way. "I heard you gave that author guy, Homer lots of inspiration, while he was writing The Iliad and The Odyssey. True?" Calliope''s long wavy red hair, which was gathered in a loose ponytail at the back of her neck, bounced a bit as she nodded. "True." Inspiring those two scrollbooks had made her kind of famous. Though not as famous as they''d made the fifteen-year-old author Homer himself! "Then maybe you could help me too?" Medusa asked. "I''ve got a paper due on Monday for Revenge-ology class, and I''m totally blanking. Can''t come up with any ideas for it. None that are good, anyway." "What''s the topic?" Calliope asked matter-of-factly. She''d only begun to attend Mount Olympus Academy a month or so ago, but already she''d gotten used to fellow students asking her for ideas on this and that. Most of them had heard the story of how she had inspired Homer. While writing about a mortal hero named Odysseus, Homer had pleaded eloquently for her helpful ideas, asking her to "sing" to him of Odysseus, "the man of twists and turns." Just thinking about Homer made Calliope sigh dreamily. He had such a great vocabulary and was so incredibly talented. And she adored his cute spiky blue hair. But, unfortunately, she could only crush on him from afar. Because except for when she''d been helping him with his books, he seemed totally blind to the fact that she was even alive! Medusa leaned toward Calliope again. "Well?" Emphasizing her request, the snakes on top of her head curved themselves into a dozen scaly, green question marks. Calliope snapped to attention. She''d been so lost in her thoughts about Homer that she''d missed Medusa''s reply to her question! "Sorry. Spaced out for a minute. What did you just say?" Medusa let out a frustrated little huff and glanced up to be sure Mr. Libon, the teacher, wasn''t yet looking for everyone''s attention, ready to start class. "I said that Ms. Nemesis told us our papers could be about anything related to revenge." "Hmm. Pretty wide open, then." Calliope tapped her chin with an index finger, thinking. "This is just off the top of my head," she said after a moment, "but maybe you could write about the relationship between revenge and war. How wars are often started as an act of revenge. Like the Trojan War. It began because King Menelaus wanted revenge against Paris after Paris stole his wife, Helen." "Maybe," Medusa said with a shrug. If her snakes had had shoulders, they probably would have shrugged too. "Got any other ideas?" she asked. Calliope didn''t mind that her first idea didn''t appeal to Medusa much. Sometimes it took a few tries to hit on the very thing that would catch someone''s interest and generate true inspiration! Her brown eyes lit up as a new idea came to her. "Or you could write about the psychology of revenge," she told Medusa. "Like, what causes vengeful feelings, the purpose those feelings serve, and if we should resist those feelings or give in to them. That kind of thing-- Oh, wait," she said, interrupting herself. "Here''s another idea! You could interview MOA students about times when they''ve taken revenge on someone and--" "Good afternoon, class," interrupted their Architecture-ology teacher, Mr. Libon. He''d stood up from his desk at the front of the room, wearing his usual sandals, which each had a single tassel for decoration. Though he was medium height, he looked plumper than he really was because he wore a tunic with dozens of pockets, each filled with drawing tools. He could whip out just about anything you needed in an instant--flat triangles of different sizes and angles, templates with shaped cutouts, or a pointy scissors-like thing called a compass for drawing any size circle. Having gotten everyone''s attention, the teacher sat down again and began digging around in the stuff atop his desk, obviously trying to find something. Good luck with that! As usual, his desk was overflowing with planscrolls and small-scale models of temples, houses, and other buildings. In addition to teaching, he was famed for designing and building Zeus''s temple in Olympia. There was a golden statue of Zeus inside it that was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World! On the wall behind Mr. Libon''s chair were numerous hand-lettered signs with encouraging or funny slogans. BE THE ARCHITECT OF YOUR BEST FUTURE. BUILD FRIENDSHIPS. ARCHITECTURE NEVER FALLS DOWN ON THE JOB. IF YOU HIT A BRICK WALL, BUILD A DOOR THROUGH IT. While the teacher was busy at his desk, Calliope leaned toward Medusa and quickly whispered, "If you want to come to my room after dinner tonight, I could give you some more ideas to choose from." "Great," said Medusa, nodding eagerly. "I''ll come, thanks." Cool, thought Calliope. Tonight wasn''t going to be all about Medusa''s need for ideas, though. The unsuspecting snaky-haired girl didn''t know that Calliope had recently decided to "interview" roommates. Because she didn''t have one yet. And she''d heard that Medusa didn''t either. Calliope had been rooming by herself in the dorm ever since she''d arrived at MOA, and she didn''t like it one bit. She missed her eight sisters--well, the seven who were not at the Academy, anyway. She still got to see her oldest sister, Muse Urania, almost daily since she taught Science-ology at the school. Unfortunately, sometimes Urania acted like she thought she was Calliope''s mom. Urania was twenty-six years old, so she was fourteen years older than Calliope! As Mr. Libon began to talk about the design projects that would be due next Wednesday--individual projects they''d been working on since Calliope had first started at MOA--she shot Medusa a look. Would the green-skinned girl make a good roommate? Hopefully, tonight''s meeting would help Calliope decide. If it seemed like they''d be a good match, she could ask Medusa to sleep over sometime. She wasn''t going to rush into anything. She wanted just the right person, someone who would be a good friend and not boss her around like Urania and some of her other sisters tended to do. They meant well, but hello? She wasn''t a baby anymore. She tuned back in to Mr. Libon just in time to hear him say, "Let''s talk about how your projects are progressing. I want to hear a brief update from each of you, one by one." Yikes! A flurry of panic swirled inside Calliope''s chest. She hoped he wouldn''t call on her first. With luck, maybe the lyrebell would ring before he got to her. Because the thing was, she wasn''t as far along on her project as she had hoped she would be by now. Mr. Libon picked up a three-sided wooden ruler from his desk. He waved it in the air to emphasize certain points as he spoke to the class. "Remember that Principal Zeus and I will be choosing the most creative and interesting project design--for a temple, a house, or whatever--to actually be built." He paused, his eyes sweeping the students. "So now is your chance to get valuable feedback from others on your projects. Who would like to go first?" Hands shot into the air. But Calliope''s wasn''t one of them. Sad to say, but as of today she still hadn''t come up with a design! And that was news she didn''t want to share, thank you very much. Mr. Libon called on a godboy with blond hair and light turquoise skin named Poseidon. Grasping his planscroll, Poseidon stood. Then he strode confidently to the front of the room. Snap! With a flick of his wrist he unrolled the planscroll. "I''ve designed a new water park," he said proudly. "It''ll be as cool as the one I built in Athens but with even more slides, more fountains, and more pools." As he spoke, he pointed to places on his scroll where he planned to add the additional features. He''d used a spiral symbol to represent the slides, triangles to represent the fountains, and circles to represent the pools. "Awesome!" a godboy named Dionysus exclaimed, pumping a fist in the air. Several other students also made noises of approval. Poseidon grinned at them all. Then with a sideways glance at Mr. Libon, he said, "If my design is chosen to be built, I''m going to name this new water park after my first one in Athens. I''ll call it Poseidon Water Waves II." Calliope had been to Poseidon''s water park in Athens, and it was indeed fantastic, with gracefully curving slides made of polished marble, tons of fountains, and pools of turquoise water topped with lily pads. It also had real mermaids, mermen, and sea monsters! But it seemed to her that just adding more of the same kinds of features wouldn''t be enough to make this new water park stand out. "How about if you added

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