Name: The Ship of Ishtar
ISBN: 9781692738358

A. Merritt

Wealthy young John Kenton receives a mysterious inscribed block of stone from an archaeological dig in Mesopotamia. It proves to encase the carved image of an ancient ship with some strange features, which proves to the counterpart of a real one in another dimension, to which the earthly counterpart is magically linked -and between the worlds of which the earthly model ship is a conduit.

The Ship of Ishtar

Tamara Turner

So. If this wasn't so sexist and racist and the love story wasn't so effin disgusting for most of the book, it really would've been a 4 star. Maybe. I wouldn't bet on it though.
Jon Kenton gets a block of cement from his archaeologist friend, who needs some help deciphering the old mesopotamian writings on that block.
And guess what. The block contained a magic miniature ship, which transports Kenton on the actual magical kinda-suspended-in-time vessel.
The first time he goes on the ship is weird, but the second(or third, I may have forgotten) time he stays long enough to find out that Sharana is Ishtar's priestess, who has to be 'possessed' by the goddess in order to battle another guy(whose name I may have mentally skipped), who is being 'possessed' by another god(whose name I may have also skipped, but bear with me).
This is basically how Kenton and Sharana interact:
Sharana:" I am yours, do whatever you want with me!'
Kenton:"I will have you whether you want it or not."
This might be an actual passage in the book, but I can't be bothered to check, tbh.
Now, who here can actually say they don't enjoy toxic romances between some dude and the woman he's forcing himself onto, who immediately realises she did actually want him and subsequentlly succumbs?
(discreetly covers camera as hopefully everyone raises their hand)
Oh, and the only POCs in the books are slaves. Makes you wonder why.
Also, everyone is so stereotypical and only acts in ways that either:
a. goes against the better judgement of our resident Gary Stu, clearly making them a villain
b. helps this plain slice of white bread of a man, pretty much always resulting in their sacrifice
I *did* like the ending. (cue evil laughter that sounds more like a chocked goat)

The Ship of Ishtar

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