Achilles

Publisher and industry reviews

Jacket review

UK Kirkus review

Homer called on the muse of poetry to help him tell his tale. In this stunning retelling of Greek myth, Elizabeth Cook has found her muse and conjures up prose that stirs the story into vibrant life. We follow Odysseus to the very mouth of Hades where he ventures to ask the prophet Tiresias if he'll ever return to his homeland. Achilles surfaces, ravenous for morsels about his son and father, the King of the Myrmidons. He needs no news of Thetis, his mother. She's the immortal sea nymph who despite her powers was unable to prevent the loss of her child. When she plunged the infant Achilles into the waters of the Styx his heel remained vulnerable. Even raising him as a girl on Skiros failed to shield him from the dangers of the Trojan wars and the astute Odysseus, who tricked him into revealing his identity. But Achilles is no mere cipher of fate. His journey may have been predestined but Cook makes it clear he had choices in the way he conducted his personal odyssey. She interweaves the stories of Hector, Helen, Paris and the centaur Chiron, Achilles's teacher. Like Achilles, Chiron is not fully of either world. When wounded his mortality causes him to feel pain. Immortality provides the time to use pain as a laboratory'; humanity supplies the motivation to understand and ease the suffering of others. Into these musings Cook draws John Keats, poet and physician. Through Achilles and Keats she explores immortality. Just as our bodies erode and are renewed, there's a physical and spiritual continuity between man and man. She likens our heritage to a game of Chinese whispers, the message changed by each individual yet still carrying forward the authentic spirit of life. A gem of a book. (Kirkus UK)

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