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Keepers of the Oracle: A Modern Fantasy of the Ancient Gods
Athena finds herself isolated in a world where skepticism has replaced faith, and the once mighty ancient gods are fading into obscurity. Keepers of the Oracle unravels a compelling narrative of waning divine power amidst the onslaught of modernity, as mortals unwittingly draw the ancient gods into a sinister dance with ancient evil.
What begins as an oath to protect the Oracle becomes a quest for an ancient relic. Before long, the quest transforms into a pursuit of archaeological looters, leading to the discovery of a dark truth exploited by an ancient one. In a clash between virtue and malevolence, Athena enlists a steadfast adherent to shield her ancient comrades from annihilation while liberating mortal captives from a life of bondage.
Only Athena’s venerable blood and blade can save us now!
Award-winning authorAlso available on Kindle Vella
What begins as an oath to protect the Oracle becomes a quest for an ancient relic. Before long, the quest transforms into a pursuit of archaeological looters, leading to the discovery of a dark truth exploited by an ancient one. In a clash between virtue and malevolence, Athena enlists a steadfast adherent to shield her ancient comrades from annihilation while liberating mortal captives from a life of bondage.
Only Athena’s venerable blood and blade can save us now!
Award-winning authorAlso available on Kindle Vella
265 pages, Kindle Edition
Published May 23, 2024
1 person is currently reading
7 people want to read
About the author
Doré Ripley
7 books2 followersAfter leaving the corporate world, Doré Ripley earned a Master's Degree in English and began teaching and writing. She wrote for a wide audience in popular magazines, scholarly journals, and textbooks. Conference papers took her all over the country to speak on myriad subjects ranging from fairy tales, comics and science fiction to Renaissance and Medieval literature, and all things noir.
As a professor at California State University, East Bay Ripley taught critical reading and writing to a culturally diverse mix of college students. She also taught many literature courses, including Comics as American Literature, Short Film, Science Fiction and Fantasy Literature, American Master Works, Children's Literature, Shakespeare and more.
She's started a new venture in the publishing world that feeds her need to write and to create beautiful designs.
As a professor at California State University, East Bay Ripley taught critical reading and writing to a culturally diverse mix of college students. She also taught many literature courses, including Comics as American Literature, Short Film, Science Fiction and Fantasy Literature, American Master Works, Children's Literature, Shakespeare and more.
She's started a new venture in the publishing world that feeds her need to write and to create beautiful designs.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
August 7, 2024
Keepers of the Oracle by Dore’ Ripley
Modern Fantasy
We all know of the Greek and Roman gods and goddesses, but Dore Ripley puts a modern twist on the ancient gods we all have come to know through history. Telling a tale of Athena and her sidekick Nike.
Athena believes herself to be one of the only gods left on earth, as the faith in the gods has now been replaced by skepticism. The gods have moved on to other realms finding that they are not as strong and powerful on earth without the believers and the praise they had in ancient times. Athena is left to protect the Oracle on earth from numerous adversaries. A malevolent new adversary comes to light and Athena finds that she is not as alone on earth as she thinks. Athena bands together with those she once thought to be long lost and one surprising new ally to defeat the threat to the Oracle and all of humanity. Along the way the journey to protect the Oracle becomes a search for ancient relics believed to have been taken by archaeological looters long ago and the discovery of a dark truth. Athena rises to protect the mortals and her ancient comrades from a malevolent force and a life of bondage.
Modern Fantasy
We all know of the Greek and Roman gods and goddesses, but Dore Ripley puts a modern twist on the ancient gods we all have come to know through history. Telling a tale of Athena and her sidekick Nike.
Athena believes herself to be one of the only gods left on earth, as the faith in the gods has now been replaced by skepticism. The gods have moved on to other realms finding that they are not as strong and powerful on earth without the believers and the praise they had in ancient times. Athena is left to protect the Oracle on earth from numerous adversaries. A malevolent new adversary comes to light and Athena finds that she is not as alone on earth as she thinks. Athena bands together with those she once thought to be long lost and one surprising new ally to defeat the threat to the Oracle and all of humanity. Along the way the journey to protect the Oracle becomes a search for ancient relics believed to have been taken by archaeological looters long ago and the discovery of a dark truth. Athena rises to protect the mortals and her ancient comrades from a malevolent force and a life of bondage.
August 28, 2024
I SO enjoyed this book. By the end of the first chapter, I was hooked and finished this in one sitting. Athena, goddess of war, is now living in a convent with Nike, the goddess of victory, at her side and usually in owl form. They keep the Oracle safe and support the nuns on Isla della Carta. A young man, Nando, ends up at the convent. Nobody is quite sure what he is - he's not fully human, not fully a God. Nando joins forces with Athena and many other Greek gods to restore balance and defeats the ancient big bad guy.
I think the premise of this - formerly mighty gods falling into obscurity in the modern world - is really interesting and many parallels can be drawn to today.
I loved Athena's stubbornness and her growth by the end of the book, as well as Nando and the balance he provided her. He was a really interesting addition and left the ending open to more books following this.
This book was paced really well and felt like the perfect length. Doré did an incredible job mixing elements from several genres and her passion in Ancient Greece was apparent from the beginning. She also deserves 5 stars for blending the Greek gods into the modern world - it was seamless.
I think the premise of this - formerly mighty gods falling into obscurity in the modern world - is really interesting and many parallels can be drawn to today.
I loved Athena's stubbornness and her growth by the end of the book, as well as Nando and the balance he provided her. He was a really interesting addition and left the ending open to more books following this.
This book was paced really well and felt like the perfect length. Doré did an incredible job mixing elements from several genres and her passion in Ancient Greece was apparent from the beginning. She also deserves 5 stars for blending the Greek gods into the modern world - it was seamless.
September 13, 2025
This book surprised me. I picked it up expecting a fast-paced fantasy adventure, and while I certainly got that (there are fight scenes that had my heart racing!), what really left a mark was the emotional core. Athena is written with such vulnerability that I often forgot I was reading about a goddess. Her doubts, her frustrations with mortals, even her flashes of pride, it all felt incredibly human.
The balance between myth and modernity is handled brilliantly. I enjoyed the archaeological storyline because it grounded the novel in reality. The looters weren’t just villains; they represented the worst of our desire to strip-mine the past. When the narrative revealed the darker truth that they were pawns in something much older and far more terrifying it hit with the force of a revelation.
If I had one quibble, it’s that a few sections leaned heavily on exposition. But honestly, I didn’t mind much because Ripley’s worldbuilding is rich and layered. By the final clash, when Athena takes up her blade, I was cheering her on as if she were a dear friend.
The balance between myth and modernity is handled brilliantly. I enjoyed the archaeological storyline because it grounded the novel in reality. The looters weren’t just villains; they represented the worst of our desire to strip-mine the past. When the narrative revealed the darker truth that they were pawns in something much older and far more terrifying it hit with the force of a revelation.
If I had one quibble, it’s that a few sections leaned heavily on exposition. But honestly, I didn’t mind much because Ripley’s worldbuilding is rich and layered. By the final clash, when Athena takes up her blade, I was cheering her on as if she were a dear friend.
July 11, 2024
The premise seems simple enough: what if Neil Gaiman’s ‘American Gods’, but set entirely in Naples and focusing on the Greco-Roman pantheon? What if the diaspora experienced by these ‘left behind’ gods wasn’t physical but temporal, and suddenly it’s the 21st century?
And that’s sort of it, except extremely well-executed. An ambitious undertaking such as this could easily have fallen into all sorts of pitfalls. It could have gotten lost in its intricate authenticity – the book doesn’t shy away from using traditional names for various Greek objects and Roman locations. Or it could have been too shallow in its modern interpretations of the Greco-Roman pantheon, which to be fair wouldn’t have necessarily been out-of-character for how that lot behaved sometimes. Or it could have gone the other way, and indulged too much in the dramas of ancient gods stuck in our modern world.
Thankfully, Doré Ripley sidesteps all of those with the grace of Achilles and the craft of Odysseus. Instead we have a very compelling story about one of the more misunderstood members of the pantheon, Athena, and her nagging but devoted companion, Nike, usually in the form of an owl. In Athena (‘Theta’) we find a kaleidoscope of very believable traits for a goddess ‘left behind’: she’s bitter, angry, frustrated…but also entirely committed to doing her job (keeping the Oracle safe). She feels abandoned, and underused. Her refuge is an island of nuns who spend their days praying and making very high quality paper and illuminated manuscripts – an incredible detail in a book full of them.
And just as it seems this might be her stagnant eternity, the book takes a brilliant left turn and introduces an antagonist from another pantheon that might have been powerful in the area. Think not so much Norse as…Old Testament. Here’s where ‘Keepers’ makes me wonder about the author’s name, because before long we have scenes that seem to charge right out of Gustave Doré: bombastic and glorious, graceful and heretical. Greco-Roman modern gods, vengeful angels, and Moloch (‘whose fingers are ten enemies’, according to Ginsberg): Oh my.
In counterpoint, I can only nit-pick. There are a few typos. A strange shift in Point of View at one point that drops Athena’s first person for a secondary character’s third, but it doesn’t break the story (and could easily be explained by ‘gods power’). I think Ripley could have left out some of the dialogue tags: there are only so many ways an owl can talk, which is to say: not many. But as I said: nit-picking.
So please, read this. Delight in the irreverent but accurate depictions of Greek gods lost to time and stuck in modern Naples. Revel in Ripley’s rich descriptions of the setting and its sacred artefacts. Laugh at a certain legendary blacksmith’s choice of fashion. And surrender to the mythological magic of this very fine book. ‘Keepers of the Oracle’ is certainly that: a keeper.
And that’s sort of it, except extremely well-executed. An ambitious undertaking such as this could easily have fallen into all sorts of pitfalls. It could have gotten lost in its intricate authenticity – the book doesn’t shy away from using traditional names for various Greek objects and Roman locations. Or it could have been too shallow in its modern interpretations of the Greco-Roman pantheon, which to be fair wouldn’t have necessarily been out-of-character for how that lot behaved sometimes. Or it could have gone the other way, and indulged too much in the dramas of ancient gods stuck in our modern world.
Thankfully, Doré Ripley sidesteps all of those with the grace of Achilles and the craft of Odysseus. Instead we have a very compelling story about one of the more misunderstood members of the pantheon, Athena, and her nagging but devoted companion, Nike, usually in the form of an owl. In Athena (‘Theta’) we find a kaleidoscope of very believable traits for a goddess ‘left behind’: she’s bitter, angry, frustrated…but also entirely committed to doing her job (keeping the Oracle safe). She feels abandoned, and underused. Her refuge is an island of nuns who spend their days praying and making very high quality paper and illuminated manuscripts – an incredible detail in a book full of them.
And just as it seems this might be her stagnant eternity, the book takes a brilliant left turn and introduces an antagonist from another pantheon that might have been powerful in the area. Think not so much Norse as…Old Testament. Here’s where ‘Keepers’ makes me wonder about the author’s name, because before long we have scenes that seem to charge right out of Gustave Doré: bombastic and glorious, graceful and heretical. Greco-Roman modern gods, vengeful angels, and Moloch (‘whose fingers are ten enemies’, according to Ginsberg): Oh my.
In counterpoint, I can only nit-pick. There are a few typos. A strange shift in Point of View at one point that drops Athena’s first person for a secondary character’s third, but it doesn’t break the story (and could easily be explained by ‘gods power’). I think Ripley could have left out some of the dialogue tags: there are only so many ways an owl can talk, which is to say: not many. But as I said: nit-picking.
So please, read this. Delight in the irreverent but accurate depictions of Greek gods lost to time and stuck in modern Naples. Revel in Ripley’s rich descriptions of the setting and its sacred artefacts. Laugh at a certain legendary blacksmith’s choice of fashion. And surrender to the mythological magic of this very fine book. ‘Keepers of the Oracle’ is certainly that: a keeper.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews