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juliabrooks103 's review for:
Ariadne
by Jennifer Saint
Gonna start out by saying I LOVE Greek mythology, more than most. And it took me ages to get through this book. I’m not sure if it’s because I already knew the mythology, thus I knew what was about to happen in most scenes, or if the writing didn’t engage me, or a mix of both.
A lot of the dialogue parts bothered me in particular, because characters would speak at Ariadne and we’d just get her internal thoughts instead of any actual dialogue from her in reply. Like let my girl actually speak! Not sure if this was a weird stylistic choice or a mistake of a debut author.
The book got better as it progressed. I thought the relationship between Ariadne and Dionysus could have been more flushed out (like show us HOW he fell in love with her!) Also wish the maenads weren’t just background characters. After all those years on Naxos you expect me to believe she didn’t become friends with any of them!?!? I don’t know what these supposedly feminist retellings have against writing female friendships (Miller did the same thing in Circe with the nymphs). Lost opportunity in my opinion.
I did like how the author handled the story of Hippolytus, but everything else about the book was pretty “meh” to me, except the ending, which I absolutely hated. By the end of the book I still felt like I had barely learned anything about who Ariadne was as a person, so I’m left wondering what the point of it was. I literally said “why” out loud when I closed the book for the final time.
Makes me hesitant to read Saint’s other retellings. She also only wrote of the gods pretty negatively. The gods of Ancient Greece are so complex, idk what the problem is for authors in showing both their light and dark aspects. Why take it upon yourself as an author to write about Greek mythology if you seemly can’t write the nuances and duplicity of the gods?
Still giving it a *generous* 2.5 stars, because I did enjoy some of the prose and the way the author was able to seamlessly tie in multiple versions of the same myth.