The Song of Achilles

This is a great story and a very enjoyable read. Madeline Miller has made ancient Greece and the battle for Troy to be accessible, believable and fun. The story is told in the first person by Patroclus, Achilles friend and companion.

It is hard to believe, in the opening chapters, that anything good can happen in Patroclus' life. Motherless, a disappointment to his father, a natural victim, he fights back against one of his tormentors, who falls, hitting his head and dies. Patroclus is exiled to Phthia, and has every reason to hate Phthia's prince Achilles, who has taken for himself Patroclus' only possession, his mother's lyre.

But Achilles has chosen Patroclus as his companion, his therapon, his brother-in-arms. The friendship grows in childhood, through their education by Chiron the centaur, in hiding on the Isle of Scyros, and eventually what Achilles was born for, the battle for Troy.

It is a strange world, Greece in the age of heroes, where the gods have children with mortals, take sides in battles, and men value honour and reputation more than happiness or friendship. Men fight in mortal combat all day but shake hands at dusk when the heralds say it is time to stop.

What makes it such an enjoyable read is Miller's handling of the psychology. Whether it is a boy's feelings about change, a father's hope for his children, a woman's choice in difficult circumstances, or a prince's reaction to not being honoured as he expects; it is all very believable and real.

It would be a rare book to have no sex, and this one includes homosexual love, but it is understated and not overly emphasised.  The battle lust is much more vividly portrayed.

What turns the book from an absorbing experience to the thrilling page turner in the final chapters is not sex, or battlefield. Nor is it medicine or Patroclus' bravery, or the loyalty of the slave girl Briseis,  though they deserve mentioning.  It is the relationship between the Greek princes.  

It is their petty jealousies, their blind pride, the perceived insults and failure to back down which cause the calamities, and gives the story its momentum.  The book is a wonderful introduction to the world of Homer, and much more easy to read.

http://www.madelinemiller.com/the-song-of-achilles/