Reviews tagging 'Child death'

Stone Blind by Natalie Haynes

8 reviews

m_lena's review against another edition

I just couldn’t finish this. I loved Hates other work but this was rambling, low character motivation and just plain bad. Bummer because Medusa is a powerful character who deserves way more.

Content Warnings

danilo_syrtis's review against another edition

2.0

challenging dark reflective slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

[Fair warning: This review contains some (major) spoilers that I will tag as such.]

This is a story told in fragments, with ever-changing perspectives. Perhaps, it starts with Athene’s birth from Zeus’ head; or perhaps, it starts with mortal Medusa being raised by her Gorgon sisters. Or maybe, everything begins with Danaë, punished for giving birth to Perseus and saved by the brother of a cruel king …

I have adored Natalie Haynes’ writing ever since I read A Thousand Ships, so I went into this with the expectation that I would like it. In some ways, I was not disappointed.

The prose is really beautiful. Especially some of the more reflective chapters are almost poetic, and it fits them well.

It is interesting to see the many different perspectives covered in this retelling.

There are not only characters like Medusa, but also perspectives I never would have thought of, like Medusa’s snakes.

As a consequence, there are at times challenges to the preceding narrative, which is very thoughtful and fascinating to read.

My favorite example is the chapter discussing whether Perseus’ »heroic deed« was actually necessary.

With these changes in perspective comes a brutal honesty – as a reader, you cannot ignore the harm done by various figures, since you either get to see it from the harmed party’s perspective or you at least know enough of their thoughts and feelings to guess how they view it. But it also shows how interwoven different mythological stories are, and how one event is the result of different characters’ actions stemming from very different motivations.

For example, Perseus alone has many different reasons to rescue Andromeda; Poseidon has his own reasons for sending a monster in the first place and Ceto specifically; the Gorgoneion has her reasons to not close her eyes … And they all stem from very different stories going on in the background, seemingly without any connection to each other.

But to be honest, I did not nearly enjoy this book as much as I hoped to.

At any given point, there are multiple things going on, and for the most part, everything feels very disconnected from everything else – which, to be fair, might be the intended effect. I still feel like there are numerous problems with this kind of storytelling in Stone Blind. First of all, not all chapters/perspectives feel important. For example, the early »Stone« chapters feel like their only purpose is to confuse the readers, and the later ones feel like part of a strategy to avoid actually describing key moments of the story

like Perseus attacking Medusa

. Which brings me to my second point – I do not like how important things are often only alluded to.

One prominent example is, as I said, Perseus’ attack. For a book this intent on asking who the real monster is, simply not showing the act that should make Perseus monstrous in the eyes of the reader does not seem wise. Although that might make me part of the »problem« – after all, why should I have to see it to understand that it is cruel and wrong?

Last, but not least, the scene changes tend to kill the tension whenever a chapter manages to build some up, which is not very often.

Good examples are the chapters about Andromeda – whenever I started to feel for her and to be eager to know what would happen next, the chapter usually ended, which felt unsatisfying every time.

This makes the book almost boring to read.

Some of the included events (and their timing) also feel a little random.

An example is the story of Erichthonios and Cecrops’ daughters. It is nice to see one of Ovid’s metamorphoses, but it is also unnecessary, since this episode does not inform Erichthonios’ later decision in any way.

Another problem I have are (some of) the characters. Most of them feel a bit flat, which might be a result of the changing perspectives – there is not much time to get to know each of them, and every time a character starts to feel tangible, their chapter ends and the reader is thrown into the perspective of a totally different character, having to get used to their view(s). I think the one to feel the least like a real character, much less a real person, is Perseus. To me, he feels more like an angry rant about bad qualities he could have that make uncritical hero-worshipping unreasonable, which is fine – it just makes him seem pretty one-dimensional, too.

There is also the matter of the ending, which is very strange and unsatisfying to me.

I just do not understand why Athene should petrify herself, or where this idea comes from. I have never seen anything about this in any Greek or Latin text, nor have I ever read about it in secondary literature about mythology. I do not even understand the logistics of it – I suppose the vague mention of how much time has passed since Perseus’ marriage to Andromeda could imply that things like the Trojan War and the events of the Odyssey have already happened by the time Athene looks at the Gorgoneion, but I am not completely sure about it, and it just feels strange to basically »kill off« such a central figure to so many famous stories without a real explanation to how all these other stories work without her (or how they have already happened before her »death«).

So … yeah. I like the writing and the fundamental idea(s) of this book. However, I do not think the execution works particularly well, and I am unsure whether I will ever reread it.

Content Warnings

theganewt's review against another edition

4.25

adventurous dark emotional reflective medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

This was a really good book. Having grown up reading Percy jackson and hearing all sorts of greek mythology, I thoroughly enjoyed how this book flipped the “traditional” story that I've heard before. It was great to get to see the world through medusas eyes and to realize how ridiculous and horrible the gods were in “reality”. I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who enjoys mythology and would like to here more from the characters who previously have not had a voice.

Content Warnings

javafenn's review against another edition

4.5

adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

This was a great take on the story of Medusa and her sisters and how the various tales of the various Greek myths intertwined with her own, tragic story. I loved the authors interpretation and delicate care of Medusa’s story and she narrates the book herself! Though several parts are beyond tragic, she adds lightheartedness and levity to the situations.

Content Warnings

nancykarreman's review against another edition

3.0

adventurous challenging dark emotional sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

Content Warnings

imageryx's review against another edition

4.0

dark informative reflective tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

This is mainly a retelling of Perseus's journey, but it does spend time on the origins of the characters. The story is told only through women's perspectives and definitely reframes the story. I love that there are many different kinds of women portrayed in the story. None of them are one dimensional or the same basic character with a different name.

I will say, the middle part of this book was a slog. The author had to set up a lot to really drive the ending home. It picks up again in the last quarter.

Content Warnings

madamenovelist's review against another edition

3.0

adventurous dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Content Warnings

jennikreads's review against another edition

4.25

adventurous reflective sad medium-paced

Content Warnings

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