From School Library Journal
Grade 7-9–Hovey has a fine idea: let humans and gods at Troy speak for themselves. Alas, they speak in doggerel. Alfred, Lord Tennyson awarded Odysseus heroic meter and noble diction; Hovey employs an uncertain trimeter, culminating in the banal exhortation, "Keep up the fight." Everything rhymes, at whatever cost ("Euripides/these"; "Zeus/excuse"). Athene is forced to rhyme with Queen. Punctuation suggests that Agamemnon has but one soldier and gives a question mark to a statement. The treacherous liar Sinon incongruously employs Shakespearean iambic pentameter. Well-chosen epigraphs from classical sources contrast sadly with the verses below them. There is a useful appendix describing the characters, and there are successful moments, e.g., Cassandra's image of her prophetic gift as a "crystalline" wall between herself and normality, and the Trojans' Festival Song, which actually sounds like a song. For most of the other poems, however, the rocking-horse rhythms are jarringly at odds with the content. Readers need to be both quite familiar with the story of Troy, and quite unsophisticated as readers of poetry. Gore's delicate monochrome drawings employ an ethereal line, and refer to classical models in the figures' profiles and accoutrements. But these pictures are not enticing enough to create an audience for this book.–Patricia D. Lothrop, St. George's School, Newport, RI
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
About the Author
Leonid Gore moved to the U.S. from his native Russia in 1991. He has illustrated The Sugar Child, The Malachite Palace, Sleeping Boy, Who Was Born This Special Day?, The Secret of the Great Houdini, The Princess Mouse, and, most recently, Saints Among the Animals for Atheneum. He is also the author and illustrator of Danny's First Snow. Mr. Gore lives with his wife and daughter in Oakland, New Jersey, where monarchs are occasionally sighted.
