Book review: Circe by Madeline Miller

By María Fernanda

Madeline Miller has gained growing popularity through her extremely successful book The Song of Achilles, which is a retelling of the famous story of Achilles and the 10 year long Trojan war. If you’ve read Homer’s The Odyssey, you have probably already heard about Circe, who is the famous witch who turned Odysseus' crew into pigs. Miller has now taken Circe in this amazing retelling of her story, with multiple characters and so many feelings, this book was fantastic. Compared to The Song of Achilles, it is a very different story, yet I consider it to be just as amazing and it just lets us all know how good of a writer Miller is.

Circe is the daughter of Helios, a Titan and the god of the sun, and Perse, a beautiful and alluring ocean nymph. She is the eldest daughter out of four, yet she is neglected by both her father and mother and is the last one of her siblings to discover their powers. She commits a terrible crime against her own family and is exiled to an island named Aiaia for all eternity. At Aiaia, she develops her powers to the fullest and takes a habit of turning men into pigs, which gains her the title of Circe the witch of Aiaia.

This book is about growth. Throughout the book Circe grows from the naive and submissive child she was into a strong and fierce witch. In the beginning, she has a very self-deprecating view of herself and she constantly lets her father and her siblings step all over her. Once she is exiled, she learns to love and accept herself for who she is, she learns that despite the taunts of her siblings, she is strong and good enough. Circe learns to defend herself and to stand her ground even against Olympians and extremely dangerous monsters. Miller does an excellent job with the character development of Circe, we see her go through grief, pain, and isolation and yet she keeps going.

This is also a very slow-paced book. I think we all imagine Greek mythology to be in relation with wars and punishments, and while it does mention that a lot, it lacks it. Some people may find this boring but it is all part of the story. I think it’s a very clever idea, it changes the perspective we have of Greek mythology and stories we are familiar with. As mentioned before, we see her go through so many things and experiences, we literally see her transform and it feels like reading about multiple lives.

This book is also about self-love. Miller portrays the insecurities and self-deprecation of Circe in a realistic and even relatable way. Circe is learning to love and accept herself throughout the book and finds peace within herself. I found this absolutely beautiful and heartwarming since, in the end, we are all learning to love ourselves more.

One thing this book lacks is a coherent timeline. I got very confused while reading it because I thought that a thousand years had passed when in reality only twenty had. Maybe it was what Miller was aiming for since Circe is exiled she herself loses track of time. However, it simply is confusing and I lost track of time in almost every chapter.

Circe’s story is simply beautiful and amazing, it is slow-paced and the timeline is confusing but it is definitely worth a read. I personally have learned a lot from this book and I’m sure many of you will too.