{"id":150060,"date":"2021-08-30T12:48:43","date_gmt":"2021-08-30T01:48:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/?p=150060"},"modified":"2021-10-05T15:42:44","modified_gmt":"2021-10-05T04:42:44","slug":"review-the-women-of-troy-by-pat-barker","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/2021\/08\/30\/review-the-women-of-troy-by-pat-barker\/","title":{"rendered":"REVIEW: The Women of Troy by Pat Barker"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"The<\/a>
Review by Isabella Noyes, CRM Assistant<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Countless re-imaginings and appropriations have been written of Homer\u2019s The Trojan War<\/em> and The Odyssey<\/em>, but few authors focus on the aftermath of Greece\u2019s sacking of the once-great city of Troy.<\/p>\n\n\n

\"Pat<\/a>

Pat Barker<\/p><\/div>\n

Pat Barker\u2019s The Women of Troy<\/strong><\/em><\/a> picks off where her previous novel, The Silence of the Girls,<\/em> left off. Our oft-forgotten narrator, Briseis is pregnant with Achilles\u2019 child, Helen of Troy is once again Helen of Sparta, and now Hector\u2019s widow, Andromache serves her deceased husband\u2019s murderer. Somehow, even though I know how the story goes, I find myself thrown by the twists and turns and broken by the tragedies of these characters\u2019 lives.<\/p>\n\n\n

As the Greeks await a good wind to take them home, differing politics and burial rights threaten to spark a civil war. Briseis has found security in her marriage to Achilles\u2019 friend, Alcimus and as a married woman, she uses her newfound \u2018freedom\u2019 to help other displaced Trojan women. Meanwhile, Helen has now found herself back in her former husband, Menelaus\u2019 bed, much to the chagrin of the whole Greek army. The seer, Cassandra has also been claimed by Agamemnon, a fate she sees as a means to an end. The pain of every Trojan woman in this story is felt, carried and conveyed through a series of interactions with Briseis, who does her best to guide them towards survival. The novel shines with Briseis\u2019 bluntness and her ever-practical nature. It is the unknown territory of this stasis in the Trojan War that makes it more unique than other retellings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I began this book with the expectation that I\u2019d get to read from Helen or Andromache\u2019s point-of-view, but was pleasantly surprised when I was introduced to two new perspectives: Calchus, a priest with an agenda; and Pyrrhus, the son of Achilles, who struggles to live up to the legend that is his father. I liked his perspective because it felt unique to this story – how often do we see retellings of the Trojan War centring on Achilles\u2019 thoughts? A lot. When have we ever read a POV on the son who never met his father? Probably never. Somehow Pyrrhus doesn\u2019t detract from the women\u2019s narrative (like I feared in the beginning); if anything he propels it forward. His actions and how many of the royal women\u2019s lives become dependent on him – a teenage boy – are the driving force of this novel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you were a fan of the first book, I am as certain as Helen is beautiful that you will love the sequel. I was also delightfully reminded of Madeline Miller\u2019s Circe <\/em>now that Briseis has become more outspoken as a married woman. It is a provocative perspective with themes of female enslavement, survival and trauma, subtly explored through visceral prose. It\u2019s the perfect read for historical and literary fiction buffs with a fancy for Greek epics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2014The Women of Troy<\/a><\/em> by Pat Barker (Penguin Books Australia) is out on the 31st of August.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Booktoberfest<\/a><\/figure><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

‘The perfect read for historical and literary fiction buffs.’<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":150065,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":""},"categories":[6678],"tags":[13682,1974,9848,4161,4212,4484,11890,13517],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/08\/TheWomenofTroy-Social.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/150060"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=150060"}],"version-history":[{"count":28,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/150060\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":152983,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/150060\/revisions\/152983"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/150065"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=150060"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=150060"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=150060"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}