altlovesbooks
So, of the mixed bag that is the mythology retelling genre, I think this was actually a pretty decent read.
I didn't know much about Atalanta going into this, aside from her golden apple experience, but from a cursory glance after finishing this book, it does a good job of retelling her experiences up to the infamous golden apple run. She's strong, she's fast, she's a crack shot with a bow, and she's out to prove that she has what it takes to hang with the men in Grecian legend. We start with her upbringing under Athena in the woods with the other nymphs, we then progress onto her stint aboard the Argo chasing the Golden Fleece with the rest, and then end the book with her trying to find her place as an ex-Argonaut.
The problem I have with this book is that the beginning and the ending are kind of weak points of the book. I think we spend overlong in the woods with her growing up under Athena, and then the last part of the book is her being all feminist-but-not-really about what to do now, and the dithering kind of grated on my nerves. Even the middle part, the quest for the Golden Fleece itself, was kind of boring, because we experience it as a ride-along character. Jason and the other Argonauts actually do everything, she experiences the quest watching what they do and talking about it. I also have a minor quibble about how Jason was portrayed in the book, but I get that the author was going for a feminist take on the whole thing, and so had to portray him as being more inept than I feel like he was.
But the writing was phenomenal, and there's definitely something here if you're still into the Greek mythology retelling genre after all this time.
So, of the mixed bag that is the mythology retelling genre, I think this was actually a pretty decent read.
I didn't know much about Atalanta going into this, aside from her golden apple experience, but from a cursory glance after finishing this book, it does a good job of retelling her experiences up to the infamous golden apple run. She's strong, she's fast, she's a crack shot with a bow, and she's out to prove that she has what it takes to hang with the men in Grecian legend. We start with her upbringing under Athena in the woods with the other nymphs, we then progress onto her stint aboard the Argo chasing the Golden Fleece with the rest, and then end the book with her trying to find her place as an ex-Argonaut.
The problem I have with this book is that the beginning and the ending are kind of weak points of the book. I think we spend overlong in the woods with her growing up under Athena, and then the last part of the book is her being all feminist-but-not-really about what to do now, and the dithering kind of grated on my nerves. Even the middle part, the quest for the Golden Fleece itself, was kind of boring, because we experience it as a ride-along character. Jason and the other Argonauts actually do everything, she experiences the quest watching what they do and talking about it. I also have a minor quibble about how Jason was portrayed in the book, but I get that the author was going for a feminist take on the whole thing, and so had to portray him as being more inept than I feel like he was.
But the writing was phenomenal, and there's definitely something here if you're still into the Greek mythology retelling genre after all this time.