A review by pixelited
Elektra by Jennifer Saint

adventurous challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Overall I enjoyed this book and thought it offered some interesting perspectives and insights into characters I only knew through mythology. I wasn’t entirely familiar with the story, so hearing it told this way was fascinating to me and without knowing the extent of everyone’s fates, I was interested to see what happened to the characters.

However, I did sometimes find myself lost in whose perspective we were seeing through. I listened to the audiobook and while I eventually got accustomed to the different narrator’s voices, they sounded similar at some points which confused me. It also took me a while to get invested into the story, as I felt that the beginning started off slow and perhaps not as interesting as it could have been. Furthermore,
I thought that it was strange that Cassandra’s perspective was written, especially after she was killed. It just seemed a bit inconsequential, and while her perspective gave us insight into Troy—I wonder if the same couldn’t have been accomplished by perhaps using Helene’s perspective instead?
I also felt a deep frustration with Elektra as a character, finding that her stubbornness was somewhat unfounded and that in turn how she treats others,
specifically by essentially using and throwing away Georgios and pressuring her brother to murder their mother despite his hesitations
, made her very unlikeable.

I did, however, enjoy the ending of the novel with the quick perspective shifts between Elektra and Clytemnestra. I thought that was a good way to keep the energy of the moment, while making sure the reader understood how both were experiencing the moment.

Overall, a reasonably good and easy read. It was interesting but simply had some aspects that I didn’t enjoy or didn’t make sense to me. I would still recommend it as a read if you enjoy Greek mythology!
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