The Goddess Effect

A Novel

By: Sheila Yasmin Marikar

Narrated by: Sheila Yasmin Marikar

Length: 10 hrs and 57 mins

Publisher's summary

All she wants is to be her best self. Is she ready? Absolutely. Does she know what to expect? Absolutely not.

Anita is over her life in New York: her dead-end job, tiny studio apartment, self-obsessed friends, and overbearing mom. So she moves west to Los Angeles in search of a new career, enlightenment, and that nebulous target...wellness.

She discovers an elite workout class called the Goddess Effect, run by a lifestyle guru named Venus who’s the very definition of #goals. One look at her Lululemon-clad acolytes sweating out their demons while dripping with confidence and Anita’s all in. When one of the class regulars takes Anita under her wing, Anita’s sure she’s found her people.

But Anita’s not so smitten that she doesn’t wonder about a few things: an inexplicable invitation to a Goddess Effect retreat, a strange tradition of secret sharing, and whispers about “enhancements” that only Venus can provide. Anita is awakening to a terrifying epiphany: the Goddess Effect isn’t quite what it seems, and it may turn her world—and that of everyone around her—upside down.

©2022 Sheila Yasmin Marikar (P)2022 Brilliance Publishing, Inc., all rights reserved.

Critic reviews

“Marikar successfully provides larger-than-life caricatures of wellness industry denizens and LA residents at large as well as an outrageous mystery waiting to be exposed.” (Kirkus Reviews)

“This is a funny and fresh coming-of-age tale. Recommended for readers of Elin Hilderbrand or Jennifer Weiner.” (Library Journal)

“The frothy exterior of Marikar’s debut hides a sharp bite that readers who enjoyed Leigh Stein’s Self Care will appreciate.” (Booklist)

Story is OK, reader was not

The story wasn’t bad, but sometimes the author should leave the reading to someone more experienced. I listened to this at 1.3x normal speed just so that it WOULD sound normal. Strange pacing, long pauses and flat intonation made this less enjoyable than it could have been.

Listening to pauses is awful

The woman who wrote this book wrote a delightful book. I enjoyed the story, she actually has a very nice voice and she does a good job. Unfortunately she also pauses long long terrible excruciating pauses all through the book. Too many, too often!!!!! I actually sped the voice to 1.5X to try to avoid the pauses and yet they were still so long that listening to this book was excruciating.

A bit slow but good story

The story is a really good one. I related having lived in LA. But I’m sorry to say that the author should not have narrated it maybe because she spoke so slowly, I could hear her breathing and so many times I thought Audible got clicked off or something because of such long pauses.

Different Narrator Needed

struggled to finish due to the narrator's monotone delivery. All the dialogue was delivered in the same way so it was hard to differ between characters. There were also long pauses when I thought my phone had shut down but it was just long pauses !!! LoL

entertaining read

Great story, very entertaining, but lost its way at times feeling a lite dragged out and slow to start.

Took a while to get to the point

Very long weird pauses made me think my speakers battery died or I lost internet connection. Didn’t even get remotely interesting until the last 3 hours and then it was very predictable.

bad narration

even at 1.5 spead the narration was so slow. I think the story would have been good but I couldn't get past the narrator.

Great concept and story line

I liked the story idea and concept. Did not enjoy the reader. Too many strange pauses. No change between voices.

Story seems interesting; narration was rough

I was interested in the synopsis and I think the story was pretty well written but better enjoyed as a paperback or eBook. I made it about two chapters and then I could listen no more. The best thing I could say about the narration is that she was very articulate and I understood every word she spoke. unfortunately, it was her articulation that made it so hard to listen to because she spoke so slowly and paused for so long.

Slow and weird narration

Hard to say what I thought of the story. The narration was slow and odd. Seems like there were way too many characters in the book and it was hard to keep track of. Lots of irrelevant content.