Madeline Miller’s The Song of Achilles was a revelation — a literary retelling of the Iliad that treated the original source with genuine love while finding a completely original emotional register. Circe is different in almost every way except quality. Where Achilles was about a love story at the centre of a war, Circe is about one woman’s millennia-long journey to understand herself.

Circe is the daughter of Helios, a titan, and a naiad — neither powerful enough to be feared among the gods nor human enough to find belonging elsewhere. She discovers she has a power the gods lack: the ability to transform living things through witchcraft, through intention and herb and will. She is exiled to Aeaea. She builds a life there. Odysseus visits. Medea visits. Scylla. Daedalus. Miller moves Circe through Greek mythology with the confidence of someone who has spent years with the sources, finding the connective tissue between stories that didn’t know they were connected.

The Voice

Miller’s Circe speaks with an authority that is entirely the author’s invention. The mythological Circe is a figure seen from the outside — through Odysseus’s account, through her reputation. Miller’s version has a complete interiority, a dry wit, a clear-eyed accounting of what the world has done to her and what she has done to the world. It is one of the finest narrative voices in recent fiction.

The Feminist Reading

Miller is not doing simple reclamation — Circe is not simply a good person misrepresented by male-authored sources. She is complicated. She has done things she regrets. But the book is deeply interested in what it means to be a powerful woman in a world built by and for powerful men, and it explores that question without didacticism.

Why YA Readers Will Love This

For readers who loved The Song of Achilles and want to return to Miller’s mythological world: Circe is a different experience but an equally satisfying one. The emotional scale is larger — a life of millennia rather than a love story — and the prose is even more assured.

For readers who love mythology and want a deep engagement with the original sources: Miller’s research is evident on every page, and the way she connects disparate mythological strands is a genuine pleasure for anyone who knows the material.

For readers who are drawn to solitude-and-survival narratives — to the question of what a person becomes when they have only themselves for long stretches — Circe’s island life is one of the more compelling versions of that experience in recent literature.

This is a crossover novel that works equally well for literary readers and YA readers who are ready for something slower and richer.

Published: April 2018 · Genre: Literary fantasy · Standalone

Frequently Asked Questions

What is Circe by Madeline Miller about? Circe is the daughter of the titan Helios and a naiad — neither powerful enough among the gods nor human enough to find belonging elsewhere. She discovers she has a power the gods lack: the ability to transform living things through witchcraft, through ‘intention and herb and will.’ Exiled to the island of Aeaea, she encounters Odysseus, Medea, Scylla, and Daedalus across a millennia-long life that is ‘one woman’s journey to understand herself.’

How does Madeline Miller’s narrative voice for Circe work? Miller’s Circe speaks with ‘an authority that is entirely the author’s invention,’ since the mythological Circe is a figure seen from the outside — through Odysseus’s account, through her reputation. Miller’s version has ‘a complete interiority, a dry wit, a clear-eyed accounting of what the world has done to her and what she has done to the world.’ The review calls it ‘one of the finest narrative voices in recent fiction.’

Is Circe a straightforward feminist reclamation of the mythological character? The review explicitly addresses this: ‘Miller is not doing simple reclamation — Circe is not simply a good person misrepresented by male-authored sources. She is complicated. She has done things she regrets.’ The book is ‘deeply interested in what it means to be a powerful woman in a world built by and for powerful men, and it explores that question without didacticism.’

How does Circe compare to Madeline Miller’s The Song of Achilles? The review calls both equally satisfying while noting they are ‘different in almost every way except quality.’ Where Achilles was a love story at the centre of a war, Circe is about ‘one woman’s millennia-long journey to understand herself.’ The emotional scale is described as larger, and the prose as ’even more assured.’ Miller’s research is described as ’evident on every page.’

Who is the ideal reader for Circe? The review identifies three audiences: readers who loved The Song of Achilles and want to return to Miller’s mythological world; readers who love mythology and want deep engagement with original sources; and readers drawn to ‘solitude-and-survival narratives — to the question of what a person becomes when they have only themselves for long stretches.’ It is described as ‘a crossover novel that works equally well for literary readers and YA readers who are ready for something slower and richer.’

Further Reading from Authoritative Sources

  • Circe — Wikipedia’s Circe article provides publication details, award history, and critical reception that helps readers understand the novel’s place in contemporary mythological fiction and its relationship to Miller’s other work.
  • the mythological Circe — Wikipedia’s Circe article on the mythological figure provides the original source material context — the Odyssey references, Circe’s role in Greek mythology — that helps readers understand what Miller is departing from and what she is inventing.