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mahoneycombs 's review for:

A Thousand Ships by Natalie Haynes
4.0
adventurous dark informative sad tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

Some beautiful chapters with different perspectives from familiar stories if you’re familiar with The Trojan War and its surrounding tales. However, in contrast with Natalie Haynes’ Pandora’s Jar, I found the analysis from her nonfiction work to be better than some of the very loud subtext of A Thousand Ships. While all of it is excellent writing built upon a mix of historical research and Haynes’ own storytelling, there are moments where A Thousand Ships seems more focused on hammering home a message of forgotten women than giving these women full-fledged stories of their own irrespective of fair criticism of the misogyny that has plagued their stories.

In this manner, I really loved the moments where Haynes depicts either familiar or brand new scenes of the war from fresh perspectives, showing more than telling.

Absolutely worth the read, and perhaps I would’ve rated it higher had I not adored Pandora’s Jar and Haynes’ nonfiction work, which has a great deal of overlap with the stories told here.