Dec 7

Dec 7 The Voyage Home (The Women of Troy, #3)

About the book

Author: Pat Barker
Publisher: Penguin Books

More info:
The StoryGraph | Goodreads
Note: Content and trigger warnings are provided for those who need them at the bottom of this page. If you don’t need them and don’t want to risk spoilers, don’t scroll past the review.

Buy and support indie bookstores (+ I earn a small commission):
Bookshop.org (print) | Libro.fm (audio)

My Review

I loved Pat Barker’s The Silence of the Girls and was delighted by its follow-up, The Women of Troy. This is the third book in the “trilogy,” although each book is capable of standing on its own as well. I’m happy to report that Barker continues to be excellent.

These books are retellings of the Iliad that focus on Trojan women who are taken into slavery by the Greek army; The Silence of the Girls is about Breseis (enslaved by Achilles), The Women of Troy is a medley of many women’s voices, and this book focuses on Ritsa, enslaved handmaiden to Cassandra, who is herself enslaved by Agamemnon. The war won (at terrible cost), they travel back to Mycenae with him, where Clytemnestra waits, still full of rage about his sacrifice of their daughter.

Many authors have written Greek retellings about the women in recent years, but in my opinion, Barker’s stand apart. She’s so good at balancing her beautiful prose with excellent pacing, and these books feel deeply literary, but are also compulsively readable and have such rich, compelling characters.

I would also be remiss to end this review without telling you how good the audiobook is. Kristin Atherton’s performance is especially excellent. For example, there are some malicious ghosts of murdered children, and whenever they spoke, I got literal chills.

Don’t miss this one, friends — or either of the previous two books!