Reviews with content warning for War - Ariadna

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Ariadna by Jennifer Saint

111 reviews

clovetra's review against another edition

adventurous challenging medium-paced

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

2.0

idk how to feel about this book. honestly i think im becoming a bit… disillusioned with greek mythology retellings at the moment. i honestly think they swing big and either really succeed or meander. and i would say this book follows the later.

i really couldn’t connect with this book at all. the ending felt rushed, and after the minotaur story was completed, the story felt as if it was floundering. obviously the entire book can’t be about life at crete but the fact it barely even covered 100 pages really let this book down.

ariadne was at best a blank slate to narrate the tales of dionysus, and at worst was incredibly boring and annoying. i understand her naivety is fundamental to her story but it was overdone 200 pages in, and by the end i was over her.

phaedra was kind of likeable i guess. i enjoyed her at the beginning, but as soon as her story moved to her & hippolyta, she became insufferable. seriously when

her & ariadne were fighting over hippolyta

i didn’t agree with either of them. her ending also felt rushed and she lacked any depth being her impulsivity and brash nature.

dionysus was boring as well. he seemed to be all over the place with his characterisation, and his ending felt like it against everything earlier set up in the book. i get that was kind of the point but from a reader’s perspective it’s just a tad stupid.

i also think i became disillusioned with saint’s writing style by the end. to begin with i loved her descriptions and her poetic way of writing, but after the 20th sentence telling us that women always pay the price for a man’s crime i was over it. this book felt like it was going in circles constantly.

now you might ask - why did i finish this? because i own a copy of this, and i was curious to see if it could redeem itself the more it progressed. i don’t like to DNF books i own - if its a library or ebook sure she’s going in the DNF pile. but i paid $26 for this i was finishing it either way. and yet why didn’t i give this a 1-star? because i was still curious to see where this went. i wasn’t invested in the characters but i was invested in where things would go.

idk i don’t think i had too much fun reading this. the beginning was intriguing, but after ariadne’s arrival at noxus the book fizzled away. and also the ending was dumb, anticlimatic and yet again rushed.

i will defo be taking a break from retellings for a while after this one!

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noragoudie's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional sad slow-paced

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

3.75

This book is my favorite of the two I have read by Jennifer Saint, but it falls into the same traps. Once again, the prose is beautiful and the backdrop and immersion into Greek mythology is masterfully done. However, strong female characters are built up only to make foolish decisions that feel neither intriguing nor thought provoking. So much potential, but the execution leaves something to be desired.

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tmholsman_1994's review against another edition

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adventurous dark sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

I really wanted to like this book because I love Greek mythology, but I honestly did not like it. I found it a little hard to get into at first and then I started to enjoy it, but then when I looked up the myth of Ariadne I started to not really enjoy this version of the myth. It doesn't really divert from the original myth, which is fine, but sometimes I want something more than just reading a 300 page book telling me about what happened to her. I liked the detail we got about what happened to her on Naxos before Dionysus came back to his island, but in my opinion I would have rather had a modern retelling than just the myth told over.

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mrs_engineer's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional medium-paced

4.5

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kfergy's review against another edition

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dark relaxing medium-paced

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

4.0

Enjoyable read - definitely a good fit for those familiar with Greek mythology and always wanted a bit more context to the parables. Good reflection upon traditional femininity and independence, though the ending doesn't necessarily leave you inspired (it's not supposed to)

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aliyahoff's review against another edition

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medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No

3.0

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lauren_shilling's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

This book was amazing! It took me way too long to read it, and it may have been a five star if I wasn't in such a terrible reading slump when I read it, because I don't really have any criticisms of it except that it didn't give me the feeling I get when I know I'm reading a five star book. Again, that may be because of the reading slump. The writing in this book was so gorgeous, and I found some new quotes that I absolutely love. There are definitely some new favorite quotes in this book for me. The portrayal of Ariadne and her sister Phaedra, and how they lead such different lives as a result of one event was so interesting. The way their experiences shape who they become and how they interact with others was very well developed. Their experiences were so different, but in many ways reading about Phaedra's experiences was like holding up a mirror to Ariadne's, allowing me to see it in a more well-rounded way, and Ariadne's experiences felt like holding up a mirror to Phaedra's. It gave a very wholistic picture of both characters, as well as some others, and it was very interesting and very well done. The conversation about women and how they are effected by and punished the carelessness of men, especially in mythology, was so in depth and thought provoking. I would love to reread this book later on when I am not in a slump, because it really made me think.

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kalliopekat's review against another edition

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emotional reflective tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

I have loved the Greek stories my entire life. As a woman who is currently examing the place of women in history, a Greek tale from a woman's point of view that was sitting on a shelf in my library intrigued me enough to check it out and I was not disappointed in my choice.
Still a young girl, Ariadne watches what happens to her mother and wonders if she, too, will one day become a victim in a game between the gods and men. She is a lucid narrator who leaves the reader sympathic to not only her own story, but the stories of many other women in the book, from the first page to the last. This tale of courage, love, motherhood, heartbreak, and the ever-fickle gods is just what the Greek stories were lacking.

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icy_queen's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark informative reflective slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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hannicherri's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.75

I really loved this book. I enjoyed hearing about Greek mythology from the female perspective. Women suffering for the passions of men is such an eternal problem, so the topic feels applicable today even though the context of the problems they are facing is ancient/mythological. My only critique of the book is that it tried to fit a lot of myths in just a few hundred pages, and I occasionally felt confused or overwhelmed by the backstories. Another warning is that there are a couple instances of extreme violence against women & children. It’s worth knowing that before going into the book.

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