Title A Thousand Ships Series --- Author Natalie Haynes Cover Art Ami Smithson Publisher HarperCollins - 2021 First Printing Pan Macmillan - 2019 Category Mythology Warnings None Main Characters The women of the Trojan War Main Elements Gods

From the Trojan women whose fates now lie in the hands of the Greeks, to the Amazon princess who fought Achilles on their behalf, to Penelope awaiting the return of Odysseus, to the three goddesses whose feud started it all, these are the stories of the women whose lives, loves, and rivalries were forever altered by this long and tragic war.

A woman’s epic, powerfully imbued with new life, A Thousand Ships puts the women, girls and goddesses at the center of the Western world’s great tale ever told.

By now I thought I would have read enough about the Trojan War, even from the women's point of view. Also, for some reason I assumed this book would be mostly about Helen, who kind of bugs me. But turns out Helen kind of bugs Calliope too, the Muse that is inspiring the "Author" (Homer? Haynes...no, the Author is a he) and it also turns out that if well done, another book about the Trojan War is actually welcome. And this one was well done.

For one thing, it covered ground that other retellings just brushed over. Like the Golden Apple part that started the war when Paris chose Aphrodite because she offered him Helen as a prize. I could feel for the poor boy, with three naked goddesses asking him to pick the most beautiful of the three, knowing that the other two were likely to smite him. I also find that there might be more to the Golden Apple than Eris being annoyed at not being invited to a wedding. I've found that most authors find it hard to swallow that a ten-year war could be motivated by a single stolen wife, and I agree. In one it was explained that the Trojans blocked the trade for tin which the Greeks needed to make their weapons (a much more reasonable reason for a war). In this one Gaia complained to Zeus that the weight of all these little humans running about on her skin was getting too much and wanted him to find a way to cull the herd. Though I have to worry if that really was the reason, given how many people we have NOW, what the Greek gods would do to ease Gaia's burden...

It also covered women who don't usually get mentioned. Like what about the wife of the first Greek to land on Trojan soil, who was also the first to die? And also used varying techniques to tell their tale. Such as for Penelope, who is one of the few who get more than one chapter from her point of view, but then she has an extra ten years to wait for her husband to come her. Her tale is told in the form of her writing him letters, telling him the stories she's been hearing from the bards about his adventures. Some she believes (would be just like him to tell the blinded Cyclops his name so he could complain to his father Poseidon and thus start the near impossible journey home) and others she starts to get annoyed at (really, he visted Circe twice and stayed for years on Caliope's island!!!). After all she had to stay chaste while he dallied about with goddesses, how badly did he really want to go home? But you could still feel her love for him, in fact Penelope and Odysseus are almost always presented as truly made for each other, unlike the unfortunately pairing of Helen and Menelaus.

I greatly enjoyed this retelling of the Trojan War and confirms that even after eight months of exploring Greek myths they haven't gotten boring yet. I just wish it wasn't a library book so I could keep it.