Ithaca

 

Ithaca- Claire North

Redhook/Hachette

Release Date: September 6, 2022

Rating: 📚📚📚📚📚

Synopsis: Seventeen years ago, King Odysseus sailed to war with Troy, taking with him every man of fighting age from the island of Ithaca. None of them has returned, and the women of Ithaca have been left behind to run the kingdom.

Penelope was barely into womanhood when she wed Odysseus. While he lived, her position was secure. But now, years on, speculation is mounting that her husband is dead, and suitors are beginning to knock at her door. 
 
No one man is strong enough to claim Odysseus' empty throne—not yet. But everyone waits for the balance of power to tip, and Penelope knows that any choice she makes could plunge Ithaca into bloody civil war. Only through cunning, wit, and her trusted circle of maids, can she maintain the tenuous peace needed for the kingdom to survive. 

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Seventeen years ago, King Odysseus sailed off to war with Troy, as did every man of fighting age on Ithaca. Over the ten years that war raged on the plains of Troy, Ithaca sent money and men who reached fighting age off to Troy, and received songs from the poets about their brave fighters in return. The old men who were left nodded and told the boys who remained that this was what being a man was all about. Seven years have passed since the war ended and none of Ithaca's men have returned- including their king. Outsiders and Ithaca's youth alike are starting to circle, trying to decide how to take the throne from a man who must be dead, but hasn't quite been declared dead- especially by his loyal wife and queen, Penelope.

For seventeen years Ithaca has managed to survive: food has made it to tables, trade has continued in the harbors, farms have continued to produce crops. Suitors are fed and the balancing act of hospitality and greed is kept in check. None of the old men question how this is done- until pirates come to Ithaca. Suddenly they have to do something, and they discover while they think they have been running things, they really have no idea what to do.

Ithaca is the book the Greek poets (and plenty of more modern fiction writers) wouldn't think to ask: what happens when the men leave home to go off fighting? The answer is obvious: the women run everything. But in Greece they are hampered by the cultural problem that they cannot be seen to run anything. In ancient Greece women have a strict place and that is behind the scenes, in the women's quarters, in the women's world. How to handle this catch-22 situation? Ithaca is narrated by Hera, the goddess of wives and marriage, a goddess who knows a few things about toxic masculinity and double standards. She doesn't pull any punches in her assessments of the characters she introduces us to and is willing to call a twerp a twerp if that's what she thinks he is- poetic hero or no. Hera doesn't have much use for heroes or poets. But women and queens, those are different matters. In daylight where Penelope plays the perfect Greek wife mourning her husband, in night's shadows where Penelope hunts for clues about the identity of the pirates and builds an army of women to defend Ithaca, Hera shows us all of Ithaca's secrets. 

In case we, as more modern readers, don't understand the situation Penelope would be in if she just stood up and told the men "You lot are idiots, I'm in charge now", there is a secondary story to bring the message home to us. Penelope's cousin Clytemnestra has been ruling Mycenae openly in her husband's absence. Now Agamemnon is back and while there were a few domestic squabbles about lovers on the side, Hera makes sure we understand that really, it was Clytemnestra's decision to rule openly that has led to her downfall. (And a bit of murder.) By the time Penelope's deception with her weaving is discovered we aren't surprised by the violence that nearly comes from it because we understand now- it isn't necessarily about the act itself but about the woman trying to take some control over her own life (or being perceived to take an active role in the lives of men) that is the real problem, and brings about death. Men must always be in control of the narrative. It is why women, even goddesses, must work in shadow and avoid being seen.  But they get the job done.

If you think that Hera is an odd choice of a narrator in the beginning, it won't take long for you to understand that she is the perfect choice to tell this story of women who are ignored or forgotten, belittled, by the men who rule. Remember, none of the stories you think you know about Hera have been told by women either.

An excellent addition to the popular mythology-alternate genre, fans of Madeline Miller, Jennifer Saint, and Natalie Haynes will definitely enjoy this new take on Penelope's story.  

I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review