Just Finished Reading: Ariadne by Jennifer Saint (FP: 2021) [386pp] 

As a princess of Crete young Ariadne knew her place, not that she liked it much. Her role was to marry someone important, someone wealthy and someone who could help her father, King Minos, consolidate his power. Minos held Crete in his grip in part by fear, fear of his wrath, fear of his palace guard but mostly through fear of the monster he controlled – the Minotaur. Ariadne knew it, him, by another name – Asterion – her brother. Trapped on Crete, just like the greatest engineer of the age, Daedalus, she was suddenly presented with an alternative, a chance to change her Fate. Each year the recently defeated city of Athens sent a number of its youth to serve as tribute and as meat to feed the Minotaur. This year amongst them was Theseus, prince of Athens. Ariadne had never seen anyone quite like him. He was quite simply a Hero who had walked out of the songs being sung in the great halls. Here was hope personified, here was her way out of her island prison and a way to rid the world of a monster. 

I can see why the retellings of Greek myths have become so popular. Most people, I think, have at least a nodding experience with these stories if only from Hollywood movies and stories from childhood. What’s different in the present retellings, apart from the language modernisation, is that the focus has generally shifted from the male heroes to the female characters often either ignored or sidelined previously. The other difference I think is that despite the existence of gods and other fantastical creatures, these stories are told very much from the human level – rather than exclusively from the viewpoint or sorely focused on gods and heroes. This particular tale is definitely one of two halves. The first 130 pages covers the well-known story of Theseus and the Minotaur. Despite the different Ariadne viewpoint, I did find this a little bit dull because it was so well known. The second part of the novel was split into two points of view – Ariadne herself and her younger sister Phaedra who becomes Queen of Athens. Although somewhat long and at times rather drawn out – especially with Ariadne’s relationship with the god Dionysus – I did find this more interesting than the first half because this part of the story/myth was unknown to me. The ending, in typical Greek tragedy fashion all rather grim and bloody, was I thought well done and did surprise me a few times with its very dark path. Much like the plays of Shakespeare there more than enough misunderstanding, grief and death to go around. 

Although this could’ve been at least 50 pages shorter without losing any of its style and impact I still liked this retelling quite a bit. I couldn’t help but think that the author essentially tacked two stories together (possibly after finding the first tale wasn’t quite long enough for the full novel treatment) but I might be being a bit harsh there! The two connected stories worked well together, and it was interesting (for me at least) to find out about what happened after the Minotaur incident. Despite a few minor quibbles this was an impressive first novel and I’m looking forward to the authors future works and I have her next book already. Recommended for all lovers of Greek myths.     

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