Hippolyta and the Curse of the Amazons (Young Heroes) [Paperback]

Jane Yolen (Author), Robert J. Harris (Author)

Book Description

Age Level: 8 and up | Series: Young Heroes

Hippolyta is a true amazon.

Proud and brave, she lives for the thrill of the hunt and for the friendship of her fellow female warriors. Then, because her mother demands it and in defiance of the laws of her people, she must take her newborn brother to his father in Troy, where she finds herself in terrible danger.

To save her people, Hippolyta must defy the gods -- and even accept the help of a boy -- and learn what it really means to be an Amazon: finding the courage to change her world.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Yolen teams up with Robert J. Harris in a continuation of their collaboration on the Young Heroes series with a second adventure starring an Amazonian princess, Hippolyta and the Curse of the Amazons.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From School Library Journal

Grades 4-8--An Amazon princess learns about honor and family in this adventure set during the Golden Age of Greece. Hippolyta's mother, Amazon Queen Otrere, gives birth to her second son and refuses to kill him as tradition demands. When she is imprisoned, she turns to Hippolyta to save the baby and take him to his father, King Laomedon of Troy. The girl's mission is successful, but she is to be killed for offending Laomedon. Tithonus, the first son of her mother and Laomedon, saves her, and they return to the Amazon capital, only to find the Amazons cursed. Athena informs Hippolyta that to save her people, she must travel to their ancestral home and sacrifice Tithonus. The siblings survive adventure and enemies as they travel, and Hippolyta must decide whether her brother's life is more important than her goddess's command. While the gods play an important part in this story, historical detail creates a realistic background for a minor character in the mythology of the Trojan War. Hippolyta is a strong heroine who faces difficult choices and grows as the story unfolds, and secondary characters are also well defined. This is a detailed, compelling story, and its nonstop action will involve even reluctant readers. Yolen and Harris offer a unique look at what Amazon life might have been like in this quality addition to the series, begun with Odysseus in the Serpent Maze (HarperCollins, 2001).
Beth L. Meister, Queens Borough Public Library, Flushing, NY
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 8 and up
  
• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: HarperTrophy; 1 edition (April 15, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0064408485
• ISBN-13: 978-0064408486
• Product Dimensions: 7.7 x 5.2 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.1 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,654,559 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Born and raised in New York City, Jane Yolen now lives in Hatfield, Massachusetts. She attended Smith College and received her master's degree in education from the University of Massachusetts. The distinguished author of more than 170 books, Jane Yolen is a person of many talents. When she is not writing, Yolen composes songs, is a professional storyteller on the stage, and is the busy wife of a university professor, the mother of three grown children, and a grandmother. Active in several organizations, Yolen has been on the Board of Directors of the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators, was president of the Science Fiction Writers of America from 1986 to 1988, is on the editorial board of several magazines, and was a founding member of the Western New England Storytellers Guild, the Western Massachusetts Illustrators Guild, and the Bay State Writers Guild. For twenty years, she ran a monthly writer's workshop for new children's book authors. In 1980, when Yolen was awarded an honorary Doctor of Law degree by Our Lady of the Elms College in Chicopee, Massachusetts, the citation recognized that "throughout her writing career she has remained true to her primary source of inspiration--folk culture." Folklore is the "perfect second skin," writes Yolen. "From under its hide, we can see all the shimmering, shadowy uncertainties of the world." Folklore, she believes, is the universal human language, a language that children instinctively feel in their hearts. All of Yolen's stories and poems are somehow rooted in her sense of family and self. The Emperor and the Kite, which was a Caldecott Honor Book in 1983 for its intricate papercut illustrations by Ed Young, was based on Yolen's relationship with her late father, who was an international kite-flying champion. Owl Moon, winner of the 1988 Caldecott Medal for John Schoenherr's exquisite watercolors, was inspired by her husband's interest in birding. Yolen's graceful rhythms and outrageous rhymes have been gathered in numerous collections. She has earned many awards over the years: the Regina Medal, the Kerlan Award, the World Fantasy Award, the Society of Children's Book Writers Award, the Mythopoetic Society's Aslan Award, the Christopher Medal, the Boy's Club Jr. Book Award, the Garden State Children's Book Award, the Daedalus Award, a number of Parents' Choice Magazine Awards, and many more. Her books and stories have been translated into Japanese, French, Spanish, Chinese, German, Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, Afrikaans, !Xhosa, Portuguese, and Braille. With a versatility that has led her to be called "America's Hans Christian Andersen," Yolen, the child of two writers, is a gifted and natural storyteller. Perhaps the best explanation for her outstanding accomplishments comes from Jane Yolen herself: "I don't care whether the story is real or fantastical. I tell the story that needs to be told."

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant characters and a great romp through mythology, April 23, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Hippolyta and the Curse of the Amazons (Hardcover)

Yolen and Harris have, once again, produced a terrifically fun book in their Young Heroes series. The basic premise - of looking at characters from Greek myth when they were children - is intrinsically full of interest, and with writers like these two in charge, it works beautifully.

One of the (many) great strengths of the collaboration of Yolen and Harris is the singular depth of the characterization. Throughout the book, Hippolyta is - well, a teenager. By turns charming, despairing, arrogant, boastful, and deeply self-absorbed, with all the focused self-righteousness of one who has never questioned what she has been told. This beats the 'the heroine/ hero is always sympathetic' vein of writing children's books hollow. Even I know too many teenagers to buy that one!

This is a coming-of-age novel in a profound sense, as Hippolyta is forced by circumstances - of kinship with a babe and a younger brother, of dealing with the gods and with more immediately threatening human enemies, of dealing with her own history and heritage - to examine her beliefs and her actions for the first time. That she does so with occasional ill-grace and stubbornness, while still acting like a true hero - saving unfortunates in distress, fighting off gryphons in a ruined city, even facing up to the gods - is a lovely tang of reality in this journey towards self-realization.

The book also has large doses of wry humour, like its companion volume Odysseus in the Serpent Maze, which makes it a fun read for both children and adults. The fact that the authors have woven into the book so much historical/archaeological information that I, for one, didn't know about Amazons, is really just the icing on the rich and satisfying cake of this novel.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars All About Hippolyta and the Curse of the Amazons, November 15, 2003

A Kid's Review

This review is from: Hippolyta and the Curse of the Amazons (Young Heroes) (Paperback)

Hippolyta and the Curse of the Amazons is about 14 year old Hippolyta, who is a amazon princess. Amazons are women who never marry. One of their laws is that if the queen bears a second son, it is to be sacrificed to the goddess that they beleive in, Artemis.Hippolyta's Mother is the queen, and she gives birth to a second son, but she refuses to let him be sacrificed. She is sent to prison, leaving Hippolyta and her four sisters in greif. One night, Hippolyta is sent by a sorceress-like woman to see her mother. Her mother asks her to bring the baby to it's father in a city called Troy. Troy happens to be a long way away from Hippolyta's home, and at first she protests. Her Mother talks to her and finally persuades Hippolyta to do it, sending Hippolyta on the journey of a lifetime. On her way, Hippolyta battles men, sea monsters, gryphons, and even Artemis herself. On the way, Hippolyta learns that she has true courage, love, and loyalty that she wasn't even aware of. Hippolyta and the Curse of the Amazons is a must read for those who like books that are full of adventure, fantasy, and horror. Hippolyta and the Curse of the Amazons is a thriller and will keep you on the edge of your seat from beginning to end!

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Mini Epic in the Making!, September 15, 2006

By 

Amy Graham (Scottsdale, AZ) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Hippolyta and the Curse of the Amazons (Young Heroes) (Paperback)

I enjoyed this...not quite as much as Odysseus in the Serpent Maze, but still, it's a highly entertaining and action packed read! We Join Hippolyta, an Amazon Princess as she is out teaching her younger sister how to hunt. Rather quickly she is called home and discovers that the birth of her newest sibling...who happens to be a boy, the second one born to her mother, puts her entire family in dire straights, due to a prophesy which says that any second son born to an Amazon must be sacrificed to Artemis rather than be turned over to it's father as is normally the case. Hippolyta sees no problem with this, but her mother refuses and is forced to step down as queen. From her prison cell, she orchestrates the baby boy's rescue and asks Hippolyta to take the child to his farther in Troy...a task that she does out of love for her mother, not out of any love for the child, which she reluctantly takes on a journey that turns into a rather thrilling and dangerous journey to remove a curse from her tribe and ultimately tests her to her to the very core of her beliefs.

Yolen and Harris give is a truly wonderful look at the mythic figure Hippolyta as she might have been in her youth, complete with a bratty, superior and very arrogant young teenage attitude. We are shown a girl, on the verge of womanhood, who starts out the story very sure of her superiority as a woman and feeling put upon for having to take her unworthy infant brother to his father, clearly thinks all men are beneath her and is, at least at the start, something of a brat. This works for me, because you're taking a young woman thoroughly indoctrinated in the ways of the Amazon and thoroughly sure of their superiority over men (and hers by extension) and who learns some valuable lessons as the tale wears on, truly a well woven coming of age tale as there ever was. I think that her character will be appreciated by young readers and adults alike, who can recognize just a little bit of themselves in her.

As she travels, we are introduced to a selection of supporting characters that are deftly drawn and which tweak just the right nerve necessary to catapult the story along at a pace just fast enough to do the story justice, and not bore us with extended descriptions. We are lucky enough to meet her Amazon rival, Molpadia; the quite just Captain of the Guard, Dares; the beautiful but arrogant and selfish King Laomendon; the ever so talkative Tithonus; and so many more...in addition to the slew of human characters, Hippolyta must also face down a sea monster, gryphon's and ultimately Artemis herself. How will Hippolyta come out of all this and which God makes a special appearance, teaching her that men may not be all that bad? You'll have to read to find out... Truly, a wonderful tale, full of excitement, adventure and lessons that must be learned...simply wonderful!