Blurb

“A bold and subversive retelling of the goddess’s story,” this #1 New York Times bestseller is “both epic and intimate in its scope, recasting the most infamous female figure from the Odyssey as a hero in her own right” (Alexandra Alter, The New York Times).

In the house of Helios, god of the sun and mightiest of the Titans, a daughter is born. But Circe is a strange child—not powerful, like her father, nor viciously alluring like her mother. Turning to the world of mortals for companionship, she discovers that she does possess power—the power of witchcraft, which can transform rivals into monsters and menace the gods themselves.

Threatened, Zeus banishes her to a deserted island, where she hones her occult craft, tames wild beasts and crosses paths with many of the most famous figures in all of mythology, including the Minotaur, Daedalus and his doomed son Icarus, the murderous Medea, and, of course, wily Odysseus.

But there is danger, too, for a woman who stands alone, and Circe unwittingly draws the wrath of both men and gods, ultimately finding herself pitted against one of the most terrifying and vengeful of the Olympians. To protect what she loves most, Circe must summon all her strength and choose, once and for all, whether she belongs with the gods she is born from, or the mortals she has come to love.

With unforgettably vivid characters, mesmerizing language, and thrilling suspense, Circe is a triumph of storytelling, an intoxicating epic of family rivalry, palace intrigue, love and loss, as well as a celebration of indomitable female strength in a man’s world.

#1 New York Times Bestseller—named one of the Best Books of the Year by NPR, the Washington Post, People, Time, Amazon, Entertainment Weekly, Bustle, Newsweek, the A.V. Club, Christian Science Monitor, Refinery 29, Buzzfeed, Paste, Audible, Kirkus, Publishers Weekly, Thrillist, NYPL, Self, Real Simple, Goodreads, Boston Globe, Electric Literature, BookPage, the Guardian, Book Riot, Seattle Times, and Business Insider.

Review

Circe is a book my wife read first and recommended to me. As someone who claims Iliad as his favorite book, I was game. I was lucky enough to attend a high school that had a mythology class. I majored in both writing and history in college, and mythology is the perfect intersection of both, so I took a few classes there as well.

Still, the only tales of Circe I could recall going in to this book was her most famous, her brief appearance in The Odyssey. This was a modern re-imagining of her life, as unending as it is.

It took me a while to get into this book, but once I did, I was hooked. That started sometime around her banishment and the tales that followed. Familiarity helped, as that was when we get to the stories of Daedalus, Icarus, Daedalus, and eventually Odysseus and family, and all the gods entailed within. Originally an unsympathetic lead, Circe grows into someone you eventually root for and appreciate in this version of her story. Yes, the better parts of the book are the familiar stories with a twist, but the character development of Circe is impressive nonetheless.

This was a worthy addition to the annals of mythology. Sarah actually read this one after reading one of Miller’s other books, The Song of Achilles. Searching online, it looks like she has a couple others. I will certainly circle around to her work.

Now then, I still need a modern retelling of Hector, who is still my favorite character in Iliad.