ARIADNE by JENNIFER SAINT | REVIEW
this was recommended to me by Anon. my motivation for reading it was that Anon said they were considering dropping it while only a third of the way through, which i thought sounded promising.
OVERVIEW: Ariadne, Princess of Crete, grows up greeting the dawn from her beautiful dancing floor and listening to her nursemaid's stories of gods and heroes. But beneath her golden palace echo the ever-present hoofbeats of her brother, the Minotaur, a monster who demands blood sacrifice. When Theseus, the Prince of Athens, arrives to vanquish the beast, Ariadne sees in his green eyes not a threat but an escape. Defying the gods, betraying her family and country, and risking everything for love, Ariadne helps Theseus kill the Minotaur. But will Ariadne's decision ensure her happy ending? And what of Phaedra, the beloved younger sister she leaves behind?
RATING: 8.7/10 i KNOW many of you disliked the book, and i'm surprised at myself, but i really enjoyed the book??? i could read it again! if you enjoy sweeter depictions of gods and heroes, this book is not for you.
AVAILABLE AT: pdf link here (google drive link) or u can spend money on purchasing a copy from a legitimate seller :-)
my review sort of developed unwittingly into an analysis of the text, so im sorry about that hahaha, but yeah. spoilers undercut!
THINGS I LIKED:
the writing style!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Saint's style of writing is nothing short of beautiful to me, i like the way she phrases things.. her writing is like smooth, dripping caramel.. it rolls off your tongue with a lovely fluidity that i really adore and it made me want to read more.
the imagery. this is related to Saint's writing style but i really liked the way she described settings and scenes... her metaphors and foreshadowing techniques were wonderful.
for example, there's this line about Asterion in Chapter 2 when we first learn of the Minotaur's true name, and since Asterion means "star", it makes the name sound very bright and hopeful. but Saint twists this around- she identifies Asterion's starry nature with the darkness that accompanies the stars.. she describes it as a "raging fire if you came too close" which is a great way of foreshadowing the future terror Asterion would come to be recognised as.
Ariadne's dancing. i know some of my mutuals weren't fans of Ariadne's constant dancing, and maybe dancing as a hobby for a girl feels like an outdated cliche, but let's be real, Ariadne isn't exactly in a society where she could be a STEM buff and the reader would believe it.. so even though yeah, it's a bit cringe, i don't hate it. i liked that Ariadne picks up her mother's hobby -- dancing is initially introduced as something Pasiphae loved to do, before she became docile and empty.
continuing on the dancing- i think that Ariadne inheriting Pasiphae's hobby was really important for setting Ariadne up as Pasiphae's successor. once Pasiphae becomes a crumbling shell of a woman following Asterion's birth, she essentially becomes a recluse and doesn't have any real further use to Minos-- but Minos' eldest child, Androgeos, is already dead and out of the picture, and the other brother (whose name is escaping me rn sorry haha) gets sent to live with his uncle, so now that Ariadne is the oldest, Minos' eyes are naturally on her to see how she can be used in his interest. and that's exactly where the story goes- Pasiphae takes a back seat, and Ariadne gets betrothed to Cinyras, etc. so, i do appreciate the dancing motif, i think it worked.
the darkness looming behind Theseus- another foreshadowing technique. even if you were unfamiliar with Theseus and Ariadne's myth, it was obvious that, handsome and lovely as Theseus appeared, something sinister was going to happen to Ariadne at Theseus' hands.. i like the change from the noble dolphin to the cunning shark imagery change in Chapter 6.. it makes you want to read on and see who exactly Theseus is.
the inclusion of Heracles. in my mind, Heracles is THE ultimate hero.. i picture him, as many do, to be the greatest of the greek heroes, so the image of him being a role model of sorts to Theseus works well, and also gives us more hints as to the kind of guy Theseus is. even in the myths, there are many parallels between Heracles and Theseus that other heroes can't really boast of-- quest-like adventures where they fight monster after monster, attempt challenges, abduct women, etc.
Medea and Theseus' relationship. i don't think i've ever seen any interaction between them in media before, and even though Medea is my babygirl and i love her to bits, i loved the way Theseus describes her- it makes her scary and evil, and from Theseus' perspective, this made perfect sense.
plot pacing was nice. not too fast, not too slow. i did think maybe Ariadne's deliberation about helping Theseus or not could have been expanded more (she did it rather quickly), but all in all, good pace.
Dionysus' debut in the book.. it was nice. he was still godly even though he was so human, which is exactly what Saint intended.
the handling of Pasiphae's love affair with the Cretan Bull. i don't think it's an easy thing to describe a woman being compelled with lust for a bull so much so that she would hide in a wooden mannequin of a cow that said bull could copulate with thereby, unwittingly, copulating with a woman without sounding absolutely bonkers. but i felt it was written really well.. the whole story of Pasiphae was so utterly sad and gloomy.. it was perfectly done. more than this, i love that Pasiphae actually doesn't abandon the Minotaur-- she mourns him, she feeds him.. it's so warped, but it made Pasiphae seem more than human, no human woman could go through all that and still nurture the child, but she does- after all, she is more than human- the blood of Helios runs in her veins.
the brutality. the tragedy. Ariadne is not a perfect heroine- sure, she's beautiful and kind, Theseus is enamoured with her, Dionysus himself marries her.. but she's not a mary-sue. she's naive, she's scared.. Phaedra is not naive, she makes up for Ariadne's flaws and yet still is so tortured.. she continues the cycle of tragedy that plagues her family, following her mother's perverse desires when she too attempts to embrace Hippolytus, her own step-son.
at first, i hated that Phaedra's infatuation with Hippolytus was not a curse of the gods but her own will-- but upon concluding the novel, i actually feel that this worked better... both sisters are so damaged, so tortured. of course they never get a happy ending. it sucks, but, i really liked how the narrative did not show bias to any character.
Dionysus' murdering the children of the Argive women.. i personally prefer stories where the gods are depicted as cruel and cold. i was worried at first when i read Dionysus' intro that he was too "perfect".. it bugged me that Theseus was made out to be so awful, but Dionysus, who in the myths does so many atrocious things himself, was excused.. but that's not how it ended up, and i really really liked that.
the absolute lack of happy endings. greek mythology is mostly tragedy, i like that the characters weren't sugar-coated. bad things happen to everyone; gods, heroes, mortals.
Hera's minor appearance at the side of Perseus. she's so 🥺
LOVED Perseus' depiction!!!!!!!!!!! he was perfect!
THINGS I LOVED AND HATED SIMULTANEOUSLY:
Theseus being reduced to an evil bastard. i think Theseus is easily one of the worst greek heroes ever, but i've always being attached to the idea that he only becomes the worst guy ever because he loses faith in the gods he adores because THEY abandon HIM first when they ask him to leave Ariadne behind for Dionysus. but of course, this doesn't happen in the novel, and Theseus actually leaves her off his own accord- i like the change, i know many people agree with this version, and i do like the idea he purposely misled Phaedra into meeting them at the wrong place.. and i also love the implication that Theseus INTENTIONALLY left the black sails up so that Aegeus would kill himself and Theseus would inherit the throne quicker.. i don't know if that's what Saint intended, but that was the implication to me, and i don't hate it. if Theseus is going to be a bastard in this book, he better be a wicked bastard.
THINGS I DISLIKED:
why would Hades feel delight at the idea of Hera, his sister with whom he shared the days of his youth inside their father's stomach with, being forced to share her golden halls with a mortal, a constant reminder of her failure to satisfy Zeus' carnal desires herself???????? this sort of just felt.. idk. it didn't make sense, there was no justification for it.
the vilification of Hera. Hera isn't even a minor character in the Theseus and Ariadne myth, but somehow, even in this story where she has no major role, she's being vilified??? how did Ariadne not see the parallels between her and Hera?? both women married/nearly married a man whom they trusted, but end up back-stabbing and leaving them for other women?!! why would Hera, of all the gods, be the one Saint chose to vilify?
relating to this-- when Ariadne falls pregnant, she pours libations for Eileithyia, and even Demeter, but not to Hera?? THE goddess of marriage, women, and family. it feels like Ariadne is inviting trouble on purpose!!!
there's a tendency in myth retellings for authors to try and cram in as many extra myth stories as possible.. and in this one, we had Medusa, Medea, Icarus, Ampelon, Scylla.. some were relevant, but tbh, i thought the whole thing with Daedalus and Icarus was rushed- i mean, out of nowhere Daedalus is out there with his wax wings. also, given the kind-hearted depiction of Daedalus that was introduced to us in the early chapters, i find it difficult to reconcile the image of that same Daedalus abandoning his son- just flying away as he watched Icarus plummet into the seas, not even trying to rescue him, not even considering dying with him. idk.. i thought the story was rushed.
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Okay, so, since my last post about Ariadne by Jennifer Saint I want to try and elaborate a bit more on that. This post contains spoilers. Please understand that these are just my personal opinions. I didn't really talk about the accuracy because 1) there are different versions of the myth and not everyone chooses to believe in the same one 2) a retelling is a retelling and we know that talking about accuracy is a lost cause right ???
if you have more to add, feel free to write!
I did not completely hate the book, because at least I managed to finish it lol, but still, there are some things that just didn't feel right to me.
- I don't really know how to explain it, but I found some sort of inconsistency with the writing. Some actions, thoughts, memories, places and characters where fully described in detail while some other things that were equally if not more important (in my opinion at least) were barely mentioned. Like the wedding. I believe Dionysus and Ariadne's wedding is one of the central parts of the myth, isn't it? I don't really care about reading of every single leaf of every single tree of Naxos when the marriage is barely mentioned. They had a simple wedding, just them and the maenads, okay, but really, we don't want to talk a little more about one of their best moments together? And the same with the kids. The author literally made Ariadne be like "yeah we got married and we had kids, that's it";
- Ariadne's reaction to Phaedra's death. I just can't believe that she just went and spoke to Theseus and told him what happened when she had just seen her sister's body. Okay, maybe she was so overwhelmed by everything that she couldn't even elaborate it until she got home to her husband, but still it was a bit off to me. That was HER SISTER;
- The ending ???? I hated Dionysus's reaction to her death. Just like Ariadne's reaction to Phaedra, I feel like everything was rushed and described as if it was just a small little detail of the plot. The author pictured Dionysus like "oh, my wife and mother of my 5 children just died because of my egocentric ass, goodbye love, u are a beautiful star now", she didn't elaborate on Dionysus's grief and sense of guilt at all. Okay he cried and ?? I'm pretty sure there's way more.. The last chapters just felt so dry and emotionless that they completely ruined the book.
I'll update the post if more things pop up in my mind.. As I've said before, feel free to share your opinions!
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