Circe

★★★ (3/5)

I was so excited to finally read Circe by Madeline Miller when it came in from the library. It had been very hyped on social media, had an extremely high Goodreads rating, and had even won a few awards. I'm also a huge fan of historical fiction, and was excited about the story's concept of diving into Greek mythology through the character of the lesser known goddess, Circe. Sadly, I didn't click with this book the way I thought I would. I don't know why I struggled so much with it, so I'm curious to hear if anyone else felt the same way after reading. If you disagree with my thoughts and loved this book, I'm really interested to hear what you most enjoyed!

Circe is a retelling of the life of the goddess/witch, Circe, daughter of a sea nymph (Perse) and Helios (the Titan that drives the sun chariot across the sky). It follows her life over centuries and gives the reader new perspectives on other famous characters from Greek mythology through her experiences (Athena, the Minotaur, Odysseus, and more). The book is told from her perspective and depicts struggles that most women can relate to (loneliness, heartbreak, jealousy, etc) but at the scale of an immortal being.

The book actually started off strongly for me. I loved Circe as a younger character, and was really invested in her storyline and early relationships (especially Prometheus, Glaucus, & Scylla). Unfortunately, the early plotlines seemed to fizzle out are there felt like there were a lot of missing conclusions as we started to get new characters through the rest of the book. I really respect that Madeline Miller wasn't "rewriting" history per se - she stayed pretty true to the myths (based on the very limited research I've done, aka Wikipedia) and brought life to characters in a way we hadn't known them before, which is a very cool concept. I just felt like the story went on for far too long, and as Circe aged I felt less and less connected to her as a character.

I'm giving this a solid 3/5, because like I said - I respect the concept and if you're a Greek mythology buff, this story is probably really interesting. For someone like me, though, with little knowledge around the mythology and more interest in a rich storyline, this book just didn't cut it beyond three stars. Interested to see who agrees/disagrees!