Reviews tagging 'Fire/Fire injury'

Troy by Stephen Fry

3 reviews

lucyatoz's review against another edition

adventurous dark informative sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Troy: Our Greatest Story Retold by Stephen Fry is the 3rd in his series of Great Mythology and I appreciated this storytelling just as much as I did in his previous two. 

Just as the title says it tells the story of Troy, the great mythology story of Helen, wife of Agamemmnon, the King of Mycenae, being kidnapped by Paris the Trojan, Prince of Troy, which results in a 10 year war, with the involvement of thousands of men and mortals and causes much entertainment for the Gods as they interfere, sometimes subtlety yet sometimes with cracks of thunder and bursts of lightening. 

I listened to this as an audiobook which was read by the author. I love Stephen Fry's distinctive voice and his genuine insight and passion for the subject matter that really brought Troy to life for me. 

I own a copy of this book and listened to it on BorrowBox. I read this for the 52 Book Club Summer Reading Challenge 2024, for prompt 16, Road Cycling, a time period with modern transportation. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Death, Kidnapping, Child death, Murder, Violence, Grief, and War

Moderate: Injury/Injury detail, Rape, Sexual content, Fire/Fire injury, and Animal death

javafenn's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional informative reflective tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Stephan Fry is brilliant and his story telling makes my heart so happy. As someone who views all religion as a sort of mythos and knowing Fry is a self described atheist as well, I read and listen to these stories for their window in time and purely for their stories! Fry is one of my favorite story tellers at this point and I will read anything he writes. I only give this one 4 stars simply because it really is so graphic and the death of children is just hard to read/listen to.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Classism, Abandonment, Death, Confinement, Animal death, Suicidal thoughts, Blood, Body horror, Bullying, Child death, Self harm, Violence, Death of parent, War, Grief, Gore, Kidnapping, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Suicide, and Toxic relationship

Minor: Excrement, Infidelity, Misogyny, Fire/Fire injury, Toxic relationship, Gaslighting, Slavery, Confinement, and Pregnancy

house_of_hannah's review against another edition

adventurous dark sad medium-paced

3.0

If you aready know the myths surrounding Troy then you won't get much from this book. I feel like this would be perfect for those who are first getting into the myths, but are unsure where to start, since they are presented in the order they occurred. 

It took forever for me to get through this book. I found myself really losing interest after the first 100 pages. It's actually quite easy to read, besides some of the names, but that's to be expected. However, I didn't find Stephen Fry's voice here to be very interesting. I mean, yeah, he's certainly telling us the myths, but it's just not the fresh take that I think most are looking for when it comes to retellings. 

The actual book ends on page 333 (paperback version), with the last 100 pages being the Appendix, List of Characters, Picture Credits, Acknowledgements, and Index. So it's at least less of a beast to read than it first appears. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Slavery, Violence, Infidelity, Death of parent, Death, Child death, Murder, War, Grief, and Blood

Moderate: Fire/Fire injury, Sexual assault, Kidnapping, Gore, Rape, and Pregnancy

Minor: Suicide