A female-centered retelling of the Perseus myth focusing on three separate but converging tales. The story begins with his mother, Danae, followed by Medusa, and culminating in the story of his wife, Andromeda. An interesting story that flips the old myth on its head, re-envisioning the mythological hero as instead a violent, gaslighting abuser. It removes the magical and mystical elements from the historical style tale and instead explores the potential "truth" behind the stories.

The writing in this book is beautiful and Heywood does a fantastic job of creating her characters. There was a lot of strong emotion tied to each of the sections of the story and I loved the deft way in which she managed to instill messages of feminism, autonomy, and misogyny. The underlying current of the book carried home the lesson that history is written by the victors...in most cases by white men...and as a result we aren't always necessarily given the truth in the history we have learned. Yes, this is a retelling of a myth, but all tales have some basis in fact and it's good to consider how this tale may have come into being.

Key takeaway: perspective matters. It is always good to question what the story is from the opposite point of view. Humans are not great at admitting their faults and, historically, writers have tended to want their characters (or themselves/their side in cases of nonfiction) to be seen as faultless, valiant, and in the right. Heywood's imagination in this case created a LOT of moments where I really paused to consider how the tale's core truths would be altered based on who was the teller and which characters wished to be seen in the best light. An intriguing read.