Circe
Ratings1,169
Average rating4.2
where do i begin... first time in a long time that a book's made me tear up. incredible book.
so so in love with the prose. my favourite thing about it is probably how madeleine writes about the relationships in the book (not just the romantic ones). the way characters & their relationships to circe are explored ... UGH!!!!!!
also greek myth weirdness aside i enjoyed circe/telemachus but i still wish it had been her and penelope instead
This was interesting...
This book is different from what I usually read, and it had some parts that I didn't enjoy. However, it is an amazing mythology book.
The story here is about a nymph that was sent to an island as a punishment and all her story on that island. I really recommend this to the people who like mythology and good storytelling.
Fantastic book. Very well written.
Many books that tackle tales spanning hundreds or thousands of years struggle to keep the characters engaging as they rotate in and out. The characters end up flat and uninteresting. No so in Circe. In spite of the vast scope of its tale, the characters and plot stay engaging throughout.
The worldbuilding in Circe is excellent. Circe really brings to life the world of Greek mythology, but doesn't hit you over the head with facts, details, and names. Instead, it drops bits and pieces of lore as it's relevant to the main character, building up the world bit by bit. This is the kind of worldbuilding you expect from great fantasy novels, but applied to the world and tales of Greek mythology.
After seeing Circe as the Goodread readers choice for best fantasy book of 2018, I knew I would need to check it out. The story itself follows Circe, a Greek goddess, nymph, and daughter of Helios. The prose is also striking. Each scene feels epic in nature somehow – partially from prose, but also because they're populated with familiar characters - Charybdis, Odysseus, Daedalus and too many others to name.
If you have an interest in Greek Mythology you will enjoy Circe immensely. Madeline Miller knows here classics and weaves a tale of many different gods and men together into something completely new and original while staying true to the characters. It's a retelling of the same history, but from a new point of view – shedding light on areas often passed over. If you're interested in Greek Mythology, you will likely love this one as much as I did.
*4.5 only because i loved the song of achilles so much i cant give this book the same rating.
I don't even know where to start, I liked everything about this book. Circe is an amazing character, and it's a joy to see the world of Titans and gods through her eyes over the centuries of her life. Story aside, it's also a joy to read. It felt like every paragraph was clever, poetic, and steeped in meaning.
It may not be for everyone, but I thought it was fantastic and I might want to read it again sometime.
Will I ever get over this novel? Will I ever not want to be reading it? I don't think I will. This is almost a month after finishing, and I still feel like picking it up again. Circe's words are still with(in) me. Madeline Miller's prose is beautiful, simply beautiful, captivating. Her characters are alive, lovely, hateful, present, all of the above—I honestly thought she could never top The Song of Achilles, and I'm not sure she has, but who knows? This might be it. I won't put it past her.
A retelling of Greek myth that deals head-on with a lot of the misogyny inherent to the source material. As a fan of Greek mythology that struggles with that misogyny, this is a very welcome retelling.
i have read absolutely nothing to do with Odyssey so while i may know the names (Odysseus, Jason, etc.) i know nothing about it. for the other “side stories” of Glaucos, Pasiphae, Minotaur, Daedalus, and so on, i only really know the most superficial level. i have never heard of Circe as a character or even as a mythological figure before, so i was really going in mostly blind to this. i found that i enjoyed it quite well, all in all! the writing was easy to follow, and although the driving point of the plot was kinda opaque for most of the book, the pacing and unfolding of the events were pretty engaging so i didn't really feel bored throughout (it helps that it's such a short read too). until now i have no idea exactly how much was changed from the mythology to the book, so i'm just gonna comment on the book as it is (i intend to read up more deeply on the mythology soon).
Circe is pretty much a god who struggles with (and even hates) her own divinity, and for the most part of the book, she's also just learning to understand mortals as well. the promiscuity, the ruthlessness, the sadism and general apathy of the other Greek gods was well portrayed imo, and it really gives you a sense of why Circe loathed her kind. i kinda wish that more had been done with the whole Pasiphae/Minotaur arc, when Circe had a bit of a truce with her sister after realising that they both hated the gods - it just kinda felt set up to lead to nowhere? the only plot-valuable thing to come out of that arc was Circe's fondness for Ariadne, which continues to stay on in her mind as how fragile mortality is.
i was also kinda sad that Telegonus would rather hear more about Odysseus's adventures than about his mother's, when he has never laid eyes upon him. and i was annoyed that Circe didn't assert herself more on that, and just chose to keep her life to herself in a sense. no wonder there's a gulf between herself and her son? when she would tell him sanitised and aggrandized versions of his father's adventures but not share more about her own. instead, she tells them to Telemachus. continuing from that, the ending was a little weird for me that she ended up with the son of her an ex-lover... i mean, i get that it's certainly not on the list of weirdest things in Greek mythology, but considering the fact that this was not part of the original mythology and was added in later on, it still feels weird to me.
as i've said, the writing was definitely engaging, but i had issues with how repetitive some sentence structures felt by the end. for example, “Full of pain, it was. Full of searing pain.” (not actually in the book) it was still easy enough to read though, and it didn't annoy me a whole lot, but it was obvious enough to notice and i was a little tired of it by the end.
Uno de los mejores libros que he leído este año. Historia cautivadora y que hace sentir viva a la historia de aquella ninfa. Me encantó.
A wonderful reimagining of Circe’s story. Circe, who was tortured as a child for not being beautiful enough, for not being powerful enough. Circe, who was exiled for being kind. Circe, who was naïve and tried to find the best in others. Circe, who used her powers to turn men into pigs when they tried to harm her. Circe, who finally learnt to live with herself. Circe, who is not Goddess enough, and not human enough. I felt compassion for her character, who finally found peace in who she was, even though she had done some cruel and evil acts. A morally grey character, and many many relationships - some bad, some good, some heartbreaking. What else does a story need? (for anyone looking to read a Greek mythology retelling, this might not be your cup of tea - this has little of everything else that goes on in the world of Greek Gods, this is purely Circe’s story).
I'm not going to lie it felt like a struggle to get through the first half of the book as it was quite slow paced but I really enjoyed the second half and didn't want to put it down after.
I loved the The Song of Achilles and it made me so happy to read references of it made in this book. I have always appreciated and loved Greek mythology so that's an immediate plus for me.
You can't help but feel sorry for Circe. All she wanted was to love and be loved. She was such a strong character for me. The entire time reading this I was just hoping for her happy ending.
I think the most important thing to do before going into reading this book is to not compare it to The Song of Achilles because they are in no way similar.
I really enjoyed this.
“You have always been the worst of my children. Be sure you do not dishonor me.”“I have a better idea. I will do as I please, and when you count your children, leave me out.”
This book, my god. I mourn that it is over because I could have enjoyed it forever.
This is by no means a bad book, it was actually quite enjoyable. But I didn't develop any special connection with it, hence the rating.
I feel I've given out too many good reviews, so I want to be harsh...but darn it! This is a great book!
This is an excellent retelling of the Circe myth that weaves it's way through a healthy chunk of Greek mythology. It's written in a style that should be enjoyable for readers of modern fiction. I don't think knowing old Greek stories is needed to enjoy this book, especially if you happen to like fantasy novels.
As someone who at one time had sections of the Argonautica, Iliad and Odyssey memorised (now long since relegated to a cobwebby mental box) I actually found that knowing the key points made this much more exciting.
I was on the edge of my seat muttering to myself:
“How will she handle this one?”...
“Oooh! I know who you are!”...
“Wow that's a different take!”...
“She worked that story in - nice one!”.
It did get a bit slow in places, and did take a while to get going, but it's well worth soldiering on.
Full disclosure:
I once rewrote the story of Circe as a play for a group of 8 year olds. In my retelling, Circe and Odysseus came to their understanding over shared ice cream... so I suppose I'm OK with “reimagining” the Circe myth.
Read. This. Book. I couldn't put it down and flew through it in two days. Even if you are familiar with Greek myths you will continually be surprised and moved by Circe. Much like the play The Penelopeiad, hearing this story directly “from the source,” as it were is a fantastic treat. As I closed this book it occurred to be that maybe there aren't as many differences between Gods and mortals after all.
This is a stunning reselling of Circe's mythology with a strong emphasis on her relationships, primarily with men. It's fascinating to watch Circe weave through life with her father, brothers, and lovers, watching how so many male figures seem to control her path as she perseveres in her love of mortals. She is pitted against the women who should be her allies and left with her own loneliness as one by one people try to dismiss her as a flat archetype. Then we get characters like Daedalus and Telemachus, powerful contrasts to the toxic masculinity surrounding Circe. Miller takes these ancient stories and weaves them into a seamless tapestry (see what I did there?) that speaks to very modern themes. I can't wait to read more of her retellings.
The feminist themes and prose are highlights of this retelling, but its strengths end there and those strengths honestly kind of clash. Perhaps a side effect of the audiobook narrator, but the characterization rings decently hollow for me and the pacing trends towards aimless. A dash of modernity just isn't enough and I just think that if you're going to retell a myth centuries old in today's day and age, it's got to add something more substantive from a modern lens beyond the feminist angle presented here.
