Ancient myths take on new life and humanity in Daughters of Sparta, Claire Heywood's moving debut.
As a young princess, Klytemnestra expected to be her father's heir, that the man she would marry would rule her home kingdom of Sparta after him, and that her beautiful younger sister, Helen, would be sent away to cement an alliance with a foreign king. However, their father's strategy plays out differently, and Klytemnestra is given to King Agamemnon to be the queen of Mycenae, while Helen's husband, Agamemnon's younger brother Menelaus, will have Sparta. Both sisters, even as queens, are meant to be confined to the private lives of their families, but both will reach for more: Helen in her famous abandonment of her home for Troy, and Klytemnestra in her husband's absence during the ensuing war.
Heywood presents a version of these sisters' lives that could have been authentic for Bronze Age Greece. If there are gods, mortals do not knowingly see or interact with them. The focus is tightly on the experiences of these two women. Other familiar faces from the Iliad and classical Greek drama appear, but only as they are relevant to the sisters. The result will feel fresh even to those most familiar with the traditional stories, since events that take center stage in other versions, such as the death of Patroclus, take place outside of these characters' knowledge. Fans of Circe by Madeline Miller and the Avalon series by Marion Zimmer Bradley will be enthralled. --Kristen Allen-Vogel, information services librarian at Dayton Metro Library