Ithaca

Product Information

I've been waiting for a Penelopiad for very long now, dissatisfied as I've been by other books purporting to tell "The Odyssey" from the side of the hero's wife, so I picked this book up with much hope and excitement. Narrated by Hera, the story comments on the different ways in which the most famous queens of Greece - Helen, Clytemnestra, and Penelope - navigate the balance between motherhood, womanhood, and queenhood. But the point of view used to narrate the story is all over the place: it opens in third person universal POV, and it doesn't stay but changes all the time, so one time it becomes first person, then second person tense, then third person limited, then.

While Hera herself has a smart and sympathetic character which develops throughout the book, the story’s main focus is Penelope, a woman whom I felt I never really got to know throughout the book. It also brings Elektra and Orestes to Ithaca in pursuit of their mother Clytemnestra, a twist and non-Homeric or Aeschylean narrative choice, that sometimes works well, especially to reflect on the complicated relationship North draws between Penelope and her son Telemachus, but often their presence crowds out the Ithacans. Not only did Ithaca give me wonderful characters to root for, it did so from stories I’ve known all my life and has thus altered them in my memory. Suitors trying to gain her hand and the throne, her land being pressured to take a new King, and all sorts of trickery and manipulation that accompanies these stories and mythologies. There are moments when she is scathing in her critique of men and disdain for the ancient poets, and moments where she is softer in the fondness she feels for her queens.Claire North is actually Catherine Webb, a Carnegie Medal-nominated young-adult novel author whose first book, Mirror Dreams, was written when she was just 14 years old. She certainly never minces her words, especially in her interactions with the other gods, or when she is talking about the fragility and stupidity of men. These characters aren’t meant to be clean cut, good or bad, instead it’s meant to show the hypocrisy of, not just ancient Greece, but humanity in general, how the God’s that were and are still reviled aren’t that different from us mere humans, and this is something North does incredibly well. And Elektra is intelligent, clear-sighted, and articulate—in contrast to her brother who is portrayed as a dithery weakling.

While I did enjoy Hera’s narration, I felt that her views and perceptions dominated the story and somehow relegated Penelope’s perspective to the sidelines. I don't know how much of this was already mentioned briefly in the tales of old, and how much is from Claire North's imagination, but it feels completely seamless – as if this is how the story was meant to be told all along.It's not the first time I've come across this kind of reading of Penelope; that honor belongs to my first and only classics course, provocatively titled, "Monsters, Barbarians, and Women. While this might make the story too complicated for some, for me the interweaving of all the perspectives created a vibrant and rich world. There were some very emotional moments when really hard topics were conveyed beautifully, but there were also moments that made me laugh out loud. From the multi award-winning Claire North comes a daring, exquisite and moving tale that breathes life into ancient myth and tells of the women who stand defiant in a world ruled by ruthless men.