Madeline Miller is SO GOOD. WOW. She really followed Song of Achilles with something just as beautiful. She is such a talented writer, and given how much of this book could be slow or boring by another author, she totally keeps you hooked with every page. Her writing is so frickin amazing and I hope I get to continue reading books from her for a long long time.

I've never really known too much about Circe, just the basic stuff that's in The Odyssey, and I always got her confused with Calypso. But OH MY, I love her now. She is so cool. I loved reading about her life with Odysseus and Telegonus and I LOVED the small role that Hermes played, since he has suddenly become one of my fave Olympians. Literally everything about this book was perfect. :')

*e-ARC provided by Netgalley. All opinions are my own. *
I’m not a big poetry fan, but I am a big Greek Mythology fan. The cover for this collection immediately caught my eye on Netgalley and ‘Aphrodite’ was all I needed to put in a request for it. I’ve found it difficult to invest in most of the poetry I’ve read recently (and there hasn’t been much), but I thought I’d give this one a go since the mythological subject matter was right up my alley.

First of all, the art is really cool. I ADORED the artwork for the chapter pages, and the illustrations and mixed media art were fascinating as well. The subject matter in this is powerful, and though there are some messages that I feel have been a bit overused in recent poetry collections, there were also some new, unique ones, too. I especially loved all of the Aphrodite POV chapters. I found it easier to connect with her because I knew the background of her myths, and I really enjoyed reading from her perspective, since it’s not one I get to read from often. I’m not too fond of the constant repetitive nature of some of the passages, but there are some small parts within that are compelling.

I originally was going to rate this three stars, but I went through it a second time and found there was more that resonated with me. There’s a lot of great writing in here and I’ll probably go through it a time or two more just to continue highlighting. Both times I’ve read the entire thing in one sitting, which I think is what works against me when I read poetry. I’m going to try going through this one or two poems at a time so I can have space to digest each one properly. Overall, this is a nice little collection. I don’t have many poetry recommendations to give, but this would be one of them! Aphrodite is a badass goddess, MMKAY?