Book Review: Circe by Madeline Miller

Circe by Madeline Miller

Book title: Circe
Author: Madeline Miller
Genre: Ancient retelling, historical fantasy
Published: April 10, 2018
333 pages
My rating: 5/5

“When I was born, the name for what I was did not exist. They called me nymph, assuming I would be like my mother and aunts and thousand cousins. Least of the lesser goddesses, our powers were so modest they could scarcely ensure our eternities.”

Circe is not like her parents, the terrifying sun god Helios or the alluring nymph Perse. Slighted by other Titans, including her own family, she seeks the companionship of mortals instead and discovers she has a dark power of her own. When she turns her witchcraft against her own kind, Zeus banishes her to a deserted island, where she hones her craft and tames wild beasts. But even banishment doesn’t stop her from crossing paths with many famous figures, including the beastly Minotaur, the sorceress Medea, and wily Odysseus.

Circe is a retelling of the ancient Greek myth of the powerful witch Circe who transformed men into swine until she was bested by Odysseus in Homer’s The Odyssey. I loved Madeline Miller’s The Song of Achilles when I read it a few years ago, and I was excited to read her second novel. It wasn’t quite the emotional ride The Song of Achilles offered, but I still loved this book.

Miller’s writing style is ornate and flowery, and I can see that not everyone will love it. However, I didn’t find Circe quite as flowery as The Song of Achilles, which at times verged toward purple prose. Another (minor) issue I had with The Song of Achilles were the few anachronisms and mistakes in the Greek language the book had. I didn’t catch any obvious mistakes in Circe, if we don’t count the oddity of naming a she-wolf with a masculine name Arcturos.

The tiny problem I did have with this book was how naïve Circe was. Obviously, the divine time scale is different and even after millennia Circe would have been little more than adolescent, but I found her constant credulity grating. I also did not like how this book, like so many stories about women, used sexual violence as a plot point. Having a rape be the cause for Circe’s revenge rampage was predictable, and I would have preferred a more innovative backstory.

But all in all, the gripes I have for this book are very minor. Circe’s character growth was fascinating to read about, and I found the ending moving and poignant. It wasn’t as big of a tearjerker as the ending of The Song of Achilles, but Miller certainly knows how to write a touching ending. If you love feminist retellings of ancient myths, definitely read this book! I gave it full five stars.