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Circe: The No. 1 Bestseller from the author of The Song of Achilles Kindle Edition
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Woman. Witch. Myth. Mortal. Outcast. Lover. Destroyer. Survivor. CIRCE.
In the house of Helios, god of the sun and mightiest of the Titans, a daughter is born. Circe is a strange child – not powerful and terrible, like her father, nor gorgeous and mercenary like her mother. Scorned and rejected, Circe grows up in the shadows, at home in neither the world of gods or mortals. But Circe has a dark power of her own: witchcraft. When her gift threatens the gods, she is banished to the island of Aiaia where she hones her occult craft, casting spells, gathering strange herbs and taming wild beasts. Yet a woman who stands alone will never be left in peace for long – and among her island's guests is an unexpected visitor: the mortal Odysseus, for whom Circe will risk everything.
So Circe sets forth her tale, a vivid, mesmerizing epic of family rivalry, love and loss – the defiant, inextinguishable song of woman burning hot and bright through the darkness of a man's world.
THE NUMBER ONE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER
CHOSEN AS A BOOK OF THE YEAR BY THE GUARDIAN, TELEGRAPH, SUNDAY TELEGRAPH, I PAPER, SUNDAY EXPRESS, IRISH TIMES, TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT, AMAZON, AUDIBLE, BUZZFEED, REFINERY 29, WASHINGTON POST, BOSTON GLOBE, SEATTLE TIMES, TIME MAGAZINE, NEWSWEEK, PEOPLE, ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY, KIRKUS, PUBLISHERS WEEKLY AND GOODREADS
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherBloomsbury Publishing
- Publication date19 April 2018
- File size4342 KB
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Product description
Review
Shortlisted for the 2019 Women's Prize for Fiction
Named one of the 'Best Books of 2018' by NPR, The Washington Post, Buzzfeed, People, Time, Amazon, Entertainment Weekly, Bustle, Newsweek, the A.V. Club, Christian Science Monitor, Southern Living, and Refinery 29.
Circe is the utterly captivating, exquisitely written, story of an ordinary, and extraordinary, woman's life--Eimear McBride, author of A Girl is a Half-Formed Thing
'Circe' is a sentence-by-sentence miracle;--Michigan Daily
so vivid, so layered, you could get lost in it... Whether or not you think you like Greek Mythology, this is just great storytelling. It feels cinematic.--NPR's Here & Now
[Miller] gives voice to Circe as a multifaceted and evolving character...'Circe' is very pleasurable to read, combining lively versions of familiar tales and snippets of other, related standards with a highly psychologized, redemptive and ultimately exculpatory account of the protagonist herself.--Claire Messud, New York Times Book Review
A retelling of ancient Greek lore gives exhilarating voice to a witch... [Circe is] a sly, petulant, and finally commanding voice that narrates the entirety of Miller's dazzling second novel....Readers will relish following the puzzle of this unpromising daughter of the sun god Helios and his wife, Perse, who had negligible use for their child....Expect Miller's readership to mushroom like one of Circe's spells. Miller makes Homer pertinent to women facing 21st-century monsters.--Kirkus, Starred Review
Ambitious in scope, Circe is above all the chronicle of an outsider woman who uses her power and wits to protect herself and the people she loves, ultimately looking within to define herself. Readers will savor the message of standing against a hostile world and forging a new way.--Shelf Awareness
An epic spanning thousands of years that's also a keep-you-up-all-night page turner.--Ann Patchett, author of Commonwealth
Circe bears its own transformative magic, a power enabled by Miller's keen eye for beauty, adventure, and reinvention. Through the charms of a misfit heroine, the world of gods becomes stunningly alive, and the world of our own humanity--its questions, loves, and bonds--is illuminated. This book is an immense gift to anyone who reads to find their own bravery and quest.--Affinity Konar, author of Mischling
Circe, ' [is] a bold and subversive retelling of the goddess's story that manages to be both epic and intimate in its scope, recasting the most infamous female figure from the Odyssey as a hero in her own right.--Alexandra Alter, New York Times
In Madeline Miller's Circe - the gorgeous and gimlet-eyed follow-up to her Orange Prize-winning first novel, The Song of Achilles - the goddess is young and romantic enough at the start to feel a tiny bit let down that she's not shackled to a rock like her uncle, Prometheus, getting her liver pecked out each day.
--Laura Collins-Hughes, Boston Globe
Madeline Miller, master storyteller, conjures Circe glowing and alive - and makes the Gods, nymphs and heroes of ancient Greece walk forth in all their armored splendor. Richly detailed and written with such breathtaking command of story, you will be held enchanted. A breathtaking novel.--Helen Simonson, author of The Summer Before the War and Major Pettigrew's Last Stand
Madeline Miller's re-imagining of the witch Circe from The Odyssey makes for an intriguing, feminist adventure novel that is perfectly suited for the #TimesUp moment. Circe is also a smart read that has much to say about the long-term consequences of war and a culture that values violence and conquest over compassion and learning...Miller mines intriguing details from the original tale to imagine a rich backstory for Circe that allows readers to re-visit the world of Olympians and Titans in Greek mythology. From the court of the Titans, the reader meets Circe's parents, the god Helios and nymph Perse, and is introduced to a world of supernatural power players that is every bit as back-biting, gossip-filled and vicious as any episode of House of Cards.
--May-Lee Chai, Dallas News
Miller gives voice to a previously muted perspective in the classics, forging a great romance from the scraps left to us by the ancients....Circe is, instead, a romp, an airy delight, a novel to be gobbled greedily in a single sitting.--Aida Edemariam, Guardian
Miller, with her academic bona fides and born instinct for storytelling, seamlessly grafts modern concepts of selfhood and independence to her mystical reveries of smoke and silver, nectar and bones.--Entertainment Weekly
Miller's lush, gold-lit novel - told from the perspective of the witch whose name in Greek has echoes of a hawk and a weaver's shuttle - paints another picture: of a fierce goddess who, yes, turns men into pigs, but only because they deserve it.--NPR.org
Miller's spell builds slowly, but by the last page you'll be in awe. In prose of dreamlike simplicity, she reimagines the myth of Circe.--People
One of the most amazing qualities of this novel [is]: We know how everything here turns out - we've known it for thousands of years - and yet in Miller's lush reimagining, the story feels harrowing and unexpected. The feminist light she shines on these events never distorts their original shape; it only illuminates details we hadn't noticed before.--Ron Charles, Washington Post
The story of Circe's entanglement with Odysseus lasts far beyond the narrative of The Odyssey, making for compelling material to revisit. But ultimately it's as a character that Circe stands apart....Through her elegant, psychologically acute prose, Miller gives us a rich female character who inhabits the spaces in between.
--Colleen Abel, Minneapolis Star Tribune
This telling, in the sorceress's own words, is not the version we think we know.--New York Times 'T Magazine'
With lyric beauty of language and melancholy evocative of Keats' Ode on a Grecian Urn, CIRCE asks all the big questions of existence while framing them in the life story of the famous goddess who had the magic of transformations. A veritable Who's Who of the gods of Olympus and the heroes of ancient Greece, Circe knows them all and we see them through her perceptive eyes. This is as close as you will ever come to entering the world of mythology as a participant. Stunning, touching, and unique.--Margaret George, author of The Confessions of Young Nero
Written with power and grace, this enchanting, startling, gripping story casts a spell as strong and magical as any created by the sorceress Circe.--Mary Doria Russell, author of Epitaph
Book Description
SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION 2019
THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER
THE NEW YORK TIMES NUMBER ONE BESTSELLER
From the Orange Prize-winning, internationally bestselling author of The Song of Achilles comes the powerful story of the mythological witch Circe, inspired by Homer's Odyssey
About the Author
From the Inside Flap
In the house of Helios, god of the sun and mightiest of the Titans, a daughter is born. But Circe has neither the look nor the voice of divinity, and is scorned and rejected by her kin. Increasingly isolated, she turns to mortals for companionship, leading her to discover a power forbidden to the gods: witchcraft.
When love drives Circe to cast a dark spell, wrathful Zeus banishes her to the remote island of Aiaia. There she learns to harness her occult craft, drawing strength from nature. But she will not always be alone; many are destined to pass through Circe's place of exile, entwining their fates with hers. The messenger god, Hermes. The craftsman, Daedalus. A ship bearing a golden fleece. And wily Odysseus, on his epic voyage home.
There is danger for a solitary woman in this world, and Circe's independence draws the wrath of men and gods alike. To protect what she holds dear, Circe must decide whether she belongs with the deities she is born from, or the mortals she has come to love.
Breathing life into the ancient world, Madeline Miller weaves an intoxicating tale of gods and heroes, magic and monsters, survival and transformation. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From the Back Cover
In the house of Helios, god of the sun and mightiest of the Titans, a daughter is born. But Circe has neither the look nor the voice of divinity, and is scorned and rejected by her kin. Increasingly isolated, she turns to mortals for companionship, leading her to discover a power forbidden to the gods: witchcraft.
When love drives Circe to cast a dark spell, wrathful Zeus banishes her to the remote island of Aiaia. There she learns to harness her occult craft, drawing strength from nature. But she will not always be alone; many are destined to pass through Circe's place of exile, entwining their fates with hers. The messenger god, Hermes. The craftsman, Daedalus. A ship bearing a golden fleece. And wily Odysseus, on his epic voyage home.
There is danger for a solitary woman in this world, and Circe's independence draws the wrath of men and gods alike. To protect what she holds dear, Circe must decide whether she belongs with the deities she is born from, or the mortals she has come to love.
Breathing life into the ancient world, Madeline Miller weaves an intoxicating tale of gods and heroes, magic and monsters, survival and transformation. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Review
'This is both a fabulous novel and a fascinating retelling; the best compliment, perhaps, that any myth could hope for.' (The Daily Telegraph)
'In a thrilling tour de force of imagination, Miller makes her otherworldly heroine a complex, sympathetic figure for whom we cheer throughout.' (Mail on Sunday) --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.
Product details
- ASIN : B076ZRJQ8N
- Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing; 1st edition (19 April 2018)
- Language : English
- File size : 4342 KB
- Text-to-Speech : Enabled
- Screen Reader : Supported
- Enhanced typesetting : Enabled
- X-Ray : Enabled
- Word Wise : Enabled
- Sticky notes : On Kindle Scribe
- Print length : 347 pages
- Page numbers source ISBN : 1526610140
- Best Sellers Rank: 2,369 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- Customer reviews:
About the author

Madeline Miller grew up in New York City and Philadelphia. She attended Brown University, where she earned her BA and MA in Classics. She has taught and tutored Latin, Greek, and Shakespeare to high school students for over fifteen years. She has also studied at the University of Chicago’s Committee on Social Thought, and in the Dramaturgy department at Yale School of Drama, where she focused on the adaptation of classical texts to modern forms.
The Song of Achilles, her first novel, was awarded the 2012 Orange Prize for Fiction and was a New York Times Bestseller. Her second novel, Circe, was an instant number 1 New York Times bestseller, and won the Indies Choice Best Adult Fiction of the Year Award and the Indies Choice Best Audiobook of the Year Award, as well as being shortlisted for the 2019 Women's Prize for Fiction. Circe also won The Red Tentacle Award, an American Library Association Alex Award (adult books of special interest to teen readers), and the 2018 Elle Big Book Award. Miller's novels have been translated into over twenty-five languages including Dutch, Mandarin, Japanese, Turkish, Arabic and Greek, and her essays have appeared in a number of publications including the Guardian, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Telegraph, Lapham's Quarterly and NPR.org. Most recently, she has published a standalone short story, Galatea. She currently lives outside Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Visit her website at: www.madelinemiller.com
Photo credit: Nina Subin
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This is a much better book than Miller's debut 'The Song of Achilles', which despite some lovely passages seemed to be constantly trying to impose a 21st-century outlook on an ancient tale. A good deal of the writing is beautiful - the descriptions of Aiaia and Circe's tame beasts, the dialogue between Circe and Odysseus, the depiction of Circe's final attainment of intimacy. I like the way that Miller - unlike some contemporary writers on the classics - isn't afraid to include the gods and magic as key parts of her story. She's also very clever in getting in references to and characters from famous myths, as in Circe's trip to Crete (where she not only encounters the Minotaur, Pasiphae and Ariadne, but also has an affair with Daedalus) and the arrival of Jason and Medea on Aiaia. Circe is an intriguing and ultimately likeable heroine, and some of the other characters are powerfully and sympathetically depicted, among them the clever craftsman Daedalus, the wise and stoical Penelope and her gentle son Telemachus, and best of all, the cunning Odysseus. And impressively for a story largely set in a single location, Miller maintains the reader's interest from first to last - and gives her tale a satisfying ending.
I stop short of five stars as there were a few elements of the story that I didn't enjoy so much. I find Miller's portrayal of the gods too simplistically hostile - Athena, for example, is surely a more complex and sympathetic figure than she is portrayed here. It's a personal thing, but I didn't always like the version of myths that Miller chose: for example, I'm sorry she opted to have Ariadne killed by Artemis rather than become the consort of Dionysus, and am not sure why she turned Scylla into a squid-like monster rather than keep her iconic dog's heads. I found myself wondering at times while reading if Circe came across as a little too benign - had Miller focussed a little more on her overcoming her flaws, it might have made the story even more interesting. And - as with Natalie Haynes's 'A Thousand Ships - I think it's a shame than in her eagerness to produce a 'feminist' reworking of Greek myths, Miller ends up portraying important male characters in a very negative light. In particular, I found her depiction of Odysseus' later years - when he appears to be suffering some form of PTSD - rather depressing and felt this cunning hero deserved a better end. Still, at least Daedalus, Telemachus and - up to a point - Telegonus were appealing examples of good men.
'Circe' may not be a 'perfect' reworking of Greek myth - if such a thing can be attained. But it is compelling, extremely readable, full of interesting characters and at best beautifully written - a big leap forward from Miller's debut. Apparently her third book may be a reworking of either the 'Aeneid' or Shakespeare's 'The Tempest'. Whichever she chooses, I am keen to read it.
Our journey with Circe begins quite early on in her life when she is still a resident in her fathers halls, where he is very literally the light of her life, “He liked the way the obsidian reflected his light, the way its slick surface caught fire as he passed. Of course he did not consider how black it would be when he was gone. My father has never been able to imagine the world without himself in it.” The Sun God, Helios, is worshiped fiercely and so having the Sun for a father is a very complex thing indeed, you know that without him there will be no light and mortals and gods fear him alike, “some of the lesser gods could scarcely bare to look at him”. It’s understandable that you see him as others do, unreachable, glorious, mighty, and it would be impossible you know, and yet completely reasonable that you want to please him, and Circe does, she longs for him to just notice her, at the very least. She is not naive, simply blinded by the adoration bestowed upon Gods and fathers, “At my father’s feet, the whole world was made of gold…his flesh was hot as a brazier, and I pressed as close as he would let me”, however, as Circe grows, she can no longer fight the truth about her father, her family and the Gods at large, “She knew the stories of Helios’ temper when he was crossed. However gold he shines, do not forget his fire”. These beings are divine by blood alone, she doesn’t belong, couldn’t belong with them even if she tried, so she seeks comfort in a mortal and it is only fitting that this little Goddess, with far too many emotions than any God should have, lets love become her undoing.
My heart ached for Circe in those early chapters, she was all but trodden upon, ostracized by her siblings, Pasiphae and Perses, despised by her naiad mother Perse, with her only comfort being her brother Aeetes, “Her eyes are yellow as piss. Her voice is screechy as an owl…those were their earliest attempts at barbs, still dull, but day by day they sharpened”. Circe learns that any pleasure she finds in life is either taken away or soiled after a while, such is a life among immortals. Even with this knowledge you can’t help but try to will things to go right for her, and so when things don’t, I felt Circe’s pain as if it were my own, bore her humiliation, all the while feeling so mortified for her that it felt unkind to read about her hardships, almost as if I were adding to her embarrassment by simply observing it, “Circe’ he said, when he saw me. Just that, as if you might say: foot.” Those chapters were not easy, nor fair, but they ignited in me a fierce love for this heroine who was desperately clawing at an existence of her own, “all my life had been murk and depths, but I was not a part of that dark water. I was a creature within it”. When Circe is banished it feels simultaneously like a blessing and a curse, for she is free of her family, but, what is she without them…
Alone on her Island, Circe is forced to focus on herself in a way she never has before, she can no longer sit at her father’s feet or spend time avoiding those who barely tolerate her, and so begins her journey with the very thing that got her exiled: witchcraft. She is an amateur at first, but in time she learns to hone her craft and in turn, crafts a life for herself in this isolation,“I will not be a bird bred in a cage, I thought, too dull to fly even when the door stands open. I stepped into those woods and my life began”. She makes companions of the animals that wonder in her land, with her fierce lion like her shadow. She makes her mixtures and has her routines, her life is not necessarily full, but it is also not stifling like before, she is essentially caged on this Island, but she is also free in a way she never has been before, “what worse punishment could there be, my family thought, than to be deprived of their divine presence?”. And then the visitors come in unpredictable numbers and unpredictable times, and they force her to change again, they harden or soften her, make her paranoid where she had just once been curious, but every time, with every visitor she holds one thing steady in her being, witch, “I learned to bend the world to my will…I would have done that toil a thousand times to keep such power in my hands. I thought: this is how Zeus felt when he first lifted the thunderbolt”. She aids those in need of her help and deals with those who would do her harm, she triumphs as much as she fails, always arriving stronger and wiser on the other side.
Circe is ever changing, but what remains true at every turn, is that she is like no other titan, she doesn’t wish to be fawned over, she is content with being part of the story but not at the centre of it, “how did you know not to kneel to me? “Something Odysseus said ‘that he had never met a god who enjoyed their divinity less'”. So it is very comical indeed and at times tragic, how she finds herself caught up in what will be some of the greatest myths to stand the test of time. Alongside Circe’s personal transformation, the inclusion of all these Greek Myths had to be my favourite aspect of this book, and was definitely what blew me away the most. It is otherworldly how an author can combine so many tales in one story and not lose the essence of the main one, to have each one only add to it. I’ve never experienced this level of detail in a retelling and in so many of them, I’m completely flawed at the sheer genius of it all. I do have to say that I think that Circe’s story intertwining with Daedalus’ and Odysseus’ were probably my favourites though, “What brings the famous Daedalus to my shores?’ ‘I am honoured you would know me.’ His voice was steady as a west wind, warm and constant.” Her relationships with both of them were fascinating and beautifully displayed the woman she was becoming, “Odysseus, son of Laertes, the great traveller…he showed me his scars, and in return he let me pretend that I had none”. All of the side characters were just as brilliant and fleshed out as Circe, such is the authors way, that they never truly felt like side characters, they all demanded your attention and seemed to exist independently of you reading this book.
I could gush about this book all day and still never do it justice, but there is just so much I want to highlight and praise Miller for, because I honestly can’t find one fault in this book. This is without a doubt one of the best books that I’ve ever read, let alone concerning Greek Mythology. I am so grateful for Madeline Miller’s contribution in keeping these wonderful stories alive and injecting new life into them with her amazing writing and vision. This was a powerful story about a young Goddess, trying to find her way in the world, which is one that will stir a sense of familiarity and companionship in anyone who has felt this in life, especially young women, “I pressed on. If my childhood had given me anything, it was endurance”. Miller skillfully looks at the dynamics between men and women, Greeks and Goddesses in Ancient Greece, and how our decisions really do make us, but it is never too late to take back control of your life. Circe transforms from being a timid little thing, to freely taking lovers, challenging greater Gods and turning men into pigs and I couldn’t of been prouder, “Any other day in all my years of life I would of curled upon myself and wept. But that day his scorn was like a spark falling on dry tinder”. I urge you to pick up this book and experience the story of Circe and the Greek Gods as you never have before, I dare you not to cower before them on the page, for they are that well written. Once again, Miller’s writing is as beautiful and sharp as ever, (I literally highlighted most of this book) and she has cemented her place as one, if not my favourite writer of all time, you’d only be doing yourself a disservice if you never pick up her work.









