Title: Circe
Author: Miller, Madeline
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
Pages: 393
Date Read: 27 May 2019
Bookshelves: read, favorites
My Rating (out of 5): ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
In this book, Circe tells her tale of acceptance, love, and defiance— a story that begins with Circe scrambling in futility for recognition at the golden feet of Helios, her father. Circe struggles with self-worth as she tries to find her place among her beautiful sister nymphs and the vastness of her father’s kingdom. Too many times, she gets battered with harsh words from her gorgeous sisters and is regarded with scorn by both her parents.
After self-confessing to the use of magic for purposes of love and jealousy, Circe draws the ire of Zeus and gets banished to the island of Aiaia. There she hones her craft as a witch, sometimes sacrificing days to understand the rhythms of flowers and the sounds of trees. Her dedication and steadfastness to her work would protect her from the savagery of perverted sailors and even earn her the recognition she spent the majority of her childhood looking for.
For me, the beauty of this book lay in how Circe told and lived her truth. The further I went into the book, the better I got to know Circe. She tells her story from infancy —as a goddess with no talents, through love, childbirth witchcraft, and relationships with mortal men, right to when she challenged Athena as an accomplished witch— and not for once did I lose interest in her character. Cire’s person was such that you’d stay rooting for her even when it’s clear she was in the wrong.
It is true that Greek stories have endured countless re-tellings and as a Greek mythology enthusiast myself, I was a tad reluctant to pick up this book. But four hundred pages after, I am happy with my decision to give the book a try. Madeline Miller is such a beautiful writer; in the way she weaves her words and develops her characters. Her style and textual elegance jump at you from the first few paragraphs and stays with you till you encounter her brilliance afresh in her other books.
You will not find a better book on Greek mythology or any mythology at all. A spell-binding book about a witch written by Madeline Miller— a god.
Tell me. Tell me. What’s not to love!