Greek Mythology Double Feature: "Circe" and "Percy Jackson"

Circe by Madeline Miller

This work is a retelling and re-contextualization of the ancient Greek myth of Circe. With that said, I am not particularly well-versed in Greek mythology. As such, my review, will focus more on the story and character development than to assess the story’s fidelity to the original myths.

Things That Worked For Me:

It is obvious that Miller has a strong grasp of Greek mythology (as someone with only a passing familiarity with it). As such, many well-known characters from Greek myth make an appearance, from Odysseus to Icarus.
I really enjoyed the way Miller critiques ancient Greek society, and by extension, modern society, through Circe.
(CW: Rape) The book includes a rape scene, but it is not graphic or lurid. The scene’s inclusion is not a positive, but Miller’s handling of it is.

Things That Didn’t Work For Me:

I wish more had been done with the relationship between Circe and Pasiphae; once the story leaves Crete, she isn’t really heard from again.
(nit-pick) Some sentences / passages are hard to parse because they are spoken softly; there is an occasional unexpected change in the reader’s tone / timbre.

Conclusion:

I enjoyed this book a lot, and appreciate Miller’s masterful writing and deep understanding of Greek myth. I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys Greek mythology or feminist re-contextualization of existing myths.

Check it out here.

The Lightning Thief (Percy Jackson and the Olympians #1) by Rick Riordan

Here’s the start of the publisher’s blurb; it should give you a flavor of the work without really spoiling anything: “Twelve-year-old Percy Jackson is about to be kicked out of boarding school . . . again. No matter how hard he tries, he can’t seem to stay out of trouble. But can he really be expected to stand by and watch while a bully picks on his scrawny best friend? Or not defend himself against his pre-algebra teacher when she turns into a monster and tries to kill him? Of course, no one believes Percy about the monster incident; he’s not even sure he believes himself.

Things That Worked For Me:

The Lightning Thief offers an interesting take on Greek gods of yore, and “Western Civilization”
Inoffensive to read, for the most part (though the author’s take on mental illness was … head-scratching … to say the least. Having ADHD keeps you alive in battle? What?)
“Breezy” writing style that doesn’t get too bogged down in things like “detail,” or, “character development.” (Then again, I guess I shouldn’t be too snarky given the target audience of the work.)

Things That Didn’t:

If you’ve read literally any other book, you’ll see the twists from a mile away
The vocal performance is OK for the “kid” characters (aka Percy and his companions), but doesn’t really hold up as well for the adults (especially for the gods)
I find it hard to suspend my disbelief that a 12 year-old could do some of the things described in the book
This is another fairly generic YA novel in a sea of them, and doesn’t do much to set itself apart from the admittedly crowded pack (e.g. Harry Potter, Hunger Games, Artemis Fowl, etc)
I read through the Wikipedia summaries of the various books, and apparently one of the coolest possible threads is never touched upon. (That plot thread is: e.g. if there are “western gods,” are there “eastern gods,” as well? Could they do battle, or otherwise collaborate?)

Conclusion:

If I had three words to summarize my feelings on this work, they’d be: “mediocre, but tolerable.” Nothing about it blew me away, but if you want an easy, breezy summer read with a mythological theme (or if you’ve got younglings who love Greek mythology or adventure books), this one is worth a look.

Check it out here.