Atalanta

I feel sad that I no longer want to read books like these. I love the retellings of mythology from the perspective of underrepresented women in the stories. What I don't love is the demonization of the men alongside them. We do not need to emphasize the weakness of men to draw attention to the strength of women. The women can be strong just because they WERE strong.

All of these books fall into this same pit: every man is terrible, every woman is cunning and smart. That's not true in real life and it's not true in mythology either. I feel like it cheapens the story of the women to have it so heavily focused on how all the men around them are terrible. It also makes me trust the narrative less, as none of use are perfect.

It doesn't help that I already know all of these stories as a scholar, so I know what is coming down the line.

I'm giving this three instead of two because it was well-written. The story was accurate, which some others of this genre are not.

7/10

I enjoyed this book, but wanted more. I had barely heard of Atalanta before and that was a chief motivator to read it. And I did find out more about her, and I liked how the author explored the role of women in antiquity and the reactions of the various men to Atalanta joining the Argonauts and her journey to be accepted by them and prove herself, as well as dealing with the prejudice of the wider world. All that was good. I also really liked the narrator, and the prose. It flowed really well.

I'd just say that outside of Atalanta, every character was bland. If I didnt already know about Jason and Hercules and Peleus, I'd barely be able to differentiate them. Because of that, the plot and character interactions just didn't do much for me.

I was nervous to give Jennifer Saint another try after I really did not like Elektra but I thought I might give her another chance since I enjoyed her debut, Ariadne, so much and WOW I am so glad I did. I am not a quick reader and I devoured this in 3 sittings. Atalanta's quick wit and fierce voice makes her a character you want to root for from start to finish. Jennifer's beautiful one liners spill off the page and stick with you in the best way. And I adored the ending. This could be one of my favorites of the year and one of my favorite retellings of all time.

So, of the mixed bag that is the mythology retelling genre, I think this was actually a pretty decent read.

I didn't know much about Atalanta going into this, aside from her golden apple experience, but from a cursory glance after finishing this book, it does a good job of retelling her experiences up to the infamous golden apple run. She's strong, she's fast, she's a crack shot with a bow, and she's out to prove that she has what it takes to hang with the men in Grecian legend. We start with her upbringing under Athena in the woods with the other nymphs, we then progress onto her stint aboard the Argo chasing the Golden Fleece with the rest, and then end the book with her trying to find her place as an ex-Argonaut.

The problem I have with this book is that the beginning and the ending are kind of weak points of the book. I think we spend overlong in the woods with her growing up under Athena, and then the last part of the book is her being all feminist-but-not-really about what to do now, and the dithering kind of grated on my nerves. Even the middle part, the quest for the Golden Fleece itself, was kind of boring, because we experience it as a ride-along character. Jason and the other Argonauts actually do everything, she experiences the quest watching what they do and talking about it. I also have a minor quibble about how Jason was portrayed in the book, but I get that the author was going for a feminist take on the whole thing, and so had to portray him as being more inept than I feel like he was.

But the writing was phenomenal, and there's definitely something here if you're still into the Greek mythology retelling genre after all this time.