Reviews with content warning for Emotional abuse - The Song of Achilles

The Song of Achilles is a complex and heart-wrenching tale of war, legacy, fate, and the complexities of human nature and the innate humanity of love. Over the course of an entire lifetime, readers can follow the tale of Achilles and Patroclus through honour, exile, education, relationships, and multiple grapplings of destiny. At once larger than life in its setting and impossibly intimate in its humanity. A tale of impossible war and of simple love at once.

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pantslint's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

For anyone with some vague familiarity with Greek mythology, we as readers know that Achilles and Patroclus will die. It takes a skilled author to tell a tale that has existed for over thousands of years in a new, beautiful, and interesting way, and Miller is such an author. There are also key points in the novel where I could tell she made very clear and intentional choices that added to the story.
For instance:

Writing the story in Patroclus's POV allows us to root for not only their love, but also Achilles himself,
especially when he becomes brutish (and a dishonorable asshole) in his grief towards the end
Maintaining that Iphigenia did not go willingly to her sacrifice (Ch. 18), to show how even the side we root for in the war are capable of brutality and are not to be trusted, further emphasizing how Achilles and Patroclus truly only have each other
Keeping things interesting through intense foreshadowing throughout the book, like
Patroclus's constant observations of Achilles's pink heels (already in Ch. 1!)
or
when Briseis calls Patroclus "Best of men. Best of the Myrmidons." (Ch. 28) after we learn of the new prophecy (Ch. 24)

Miller wields metaphor as if she's done so since birth because some of these lines she was seriously COOKIN shit up!!!!

"Achilles did not slur my name, as people often did, running it together as if in a hurry to be rid of it (Ch. 5)."
"I said his name... It blew through me; I was hollow as a reed hung up for the wind to sound" (Ch. 10).
"Did [Chiron] know, or only guess at Achilles' destiny? As he lay alone in his rose-colored cave, had some glimmer of prophecy come to him? Perhaps he simply assumed: a bitterness of habit, of boy after boy trained for music and medicine, and unleashed for murder" (Ch. 16). I MEAN C'MON A LITERAL ROSE-COLORED CAVE WHERE THEY LIVED OUT THEIR INNOCENT BOYHOOD ARE YOU KIDDING ME
"The only sound I hear is my own heaving lungs, air pumped into my chest and pushed from it. Hector's spear lifts over me, tipping like a pitcher. And then it falls, a spill of bright silver, towards me" (Ch. 30).
Hector wearing Achilles's armor and Achilles literally "chasing himself" (Ch. 31) because his hubris led him to chase fame... but also Hector, a killer to him but a hero to Troy. Sounds like someone we know????

This book devastated me and it's the best one I've read all year. It makes me want to write 5 different essays. A story about a love so sweet and a grief so deep. I'm so sad. I'm going to read fanfiction about Achilles and Patroclus reuniting in the afterlife now.

Content Warnings

tabea1409's review against another edition

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Flat characters, way to much talk about rape, both partners cheat and even impregnate a girl

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capt_janeway's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

The way Madeline Miller wrote falling in love, particularly queer love, was very beautiful and moving. And that is why it gets any stars at all.
Abuse and rape of women being written in such an offhand and thoughtless way is at the very least upsetting. The fact that this book is written by a woman is shocking. Firstly, I do not understand the urge of historic fiction writers to include rape because “that’s what happened in history”. GIRL. You are a fiction writer, you choose what to write.
Secondly, to have a story that focuses solely on men, and anytime a women even comes close to entering their orbit it is to be raped and abused, and written with such flippancy?
Yuck. If you insist on making me read that, at least give it the weight it deserves.
It isn’t just once in the book, its again. And again. And again.
If you are going to write about how women suffered in history, at least give it more than a passing thought.

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