Stephen Fry has put together a humorous retelling of Greek myths, focusing on the titans and gods, which is both easy to read and interesting to imagine. I listened to this as an audiobook and it was a really fun time.
Summary
It begins at the beginning - with the nothingness of Chaos. Stephen Fry takes us right back to the commencement of the Greek mythological universe, when nothingness became primordial beings like Gaia (the Earth) and Ouranos (the sky). From there we see many familiar figures like the titan Chronos, the gods Zeus, Hera, and Aphrodite, and mythological characters like Eros and Psyche and Echo and Narcissus. I can't give you too many spoilers because the stories are three thousand years old. I met both familiar figures and new ones that I'd not heard of before.
Initial Reaction
I really enjoyed this book. I knew some of the Greek myths thanks to my obsession with Percy Jackson and other Rick Riordan books, but I had never had them all set out in a timeline and with such engaging story telling. Myths are so often retold without much character and little to no dialogue, but Mythos takes this and turns it on its head. Stephen Fry includes little dialogue scenes and builds the characters to be more three-dimensional than I've read before.
Rating
I give Mythos by Stephen Fry 4 stars. You may know this but I have no real system for rating books, it's honestly just a gut feeling, so I can't tell you why I took off a star. I just did.
I really enjoyed listening to this book, especially as it was narrated by Stephen Fry himself and he has a great voice for audiobooks. I've also listened to his renditions of the Sherlock Holmes stories and really enjoyed them, so I'd recommend that to anyone with an interest in detective fiction.
I recommend Mythos for anyone who has an interest in Greek mythology and wants to learn about it in an engaging manner. I have put Stephen Fry's other Greek mythology books, Troy and Heroes, on my TBR list as well (which is growing alarmingly long).
Thanks for reading and bye for now!