Someone I used to know actually recommended for me to read the Song of Achilles back when we were in high school, and it was always on my radar but somehow forgot about it everytime I visited the book store. I finally remembered its existence back in January earlier this year and am so glad that I did because not only has it opened up this huge can of worms, it also introduced me to my favourite sub-genre of books.
As a result, I’ve spent the first half of 2025 absolutely devouring Greek myth retellings at every opportunity I can. And I need more people to talk about my love for not only Greek Mythology, but it’s retllings too, so I’m making this guide in hopes of convincing you to read your first Greek myth retelling if you haven’t already done so.
As of right now, this guide solely contain books I’ve read. I figured it didn’t make sense for me to include books I haven’t read yet since I wouldn’t be able to write about them truthfully. And because I haven’t had the chance to form my true opinion.
I feel like this goes without saying but this post might contain spoilers, so if you want to avoid those, I’d recommend skipping this post entirely or saving it to come back to when you’ve read these books yourself :))
Information
Before we get into the guide, there are a few things I wanted to clarify.
- Some people practice Hellenic Polytheism, also know as Hellenism, to worship and honour the gods/goddess mentioned in these myths. It is a genuine religion, so please be respectful if you’re going to engage with any hellenic polytheists, or Hellenists, after starting your journey in the world of Greek Mythology.
However, from my experience in watching a myriad of tiktoks from Hellenists, they’re super welcoming of new Hellenists, and encouraging of people reading about Greek Mythology.
And just because you read a Greek Myth, or a retelling, it doesn’t automatically mean you’re a Hellenist – just like any religion, it’s your choice on who/what you want to worship/honour. So if you end up loving a book and want to talk about it online, it’s just something to keep in mind when discussing – you wouldn’t want to accidentally offend anyone, but the Hellenist community is usually fairly understanding of that sort of thing.
Just lead with respect and an open heart if you choose to discuss these books online. - I highly recommend researching and learning about the origin of Greek Myths, specifically their impact and being used as inspiration in Western media’s stories to this day.
For example, Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet and A Midsummer Night’s Dream, were both inspired by Pyramus and Thisbe. Hadestown, which is a relatively new-er Broadway musical (made it’s Broadway debut in 2019), is a musical based off of Orpheus and Eurydice. Epic: The Musical, which fully released this past Christmas, is a musical retelling and adaptation of the Odyssey.
But there’s so many more stories, TV shows, movies, songs, poems, musicals, and plays inspired by these myths. It’s crazy how many myths have inspired modern-day media, it’s definitely worth looking into just to grasp how much has come from Greek Mythology.
Now that we have that out of the way, let’s dive into my guide to Greek Mythology retellings and reimaginings.
General Retellings
Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller
Dare I say this is one of the most well-known Greek myth retellings in our day and age? Even if you’ve never read it, you’ve heard of it either online or from a mutual book lover.
The Song of Achilles follows Patroclus’s upbringing, his and Achilles relationship dynamic, and their inevitable demise. The story is told from Patroclus’ point of view, so we learn about things at the same time as he does. It’s as if we as readers either become the character, or are witnessing events unfold as these characters do – I consider this writing style to be “fly on a wall”.
This is a Trojan war retelling which mainly focuses on the leading up to of the war and Achilles’ role in the war. Miller takes the story of the Trojan war and characters to tell her own character-driven story, and to offer a different and new perspective to these events.
This book is perfect for those who are just starting to get into Greek Mythology, or are looking for a queer read for Pride month. I gave this book a 4.5 rating and if you’d like to read further on my thoughts, you can check out my January 2025 Wrap Up.
Feminist Greek Mythology Retellings
These retellings focus on goddesses as characters and their stories, and offer an alternative perspective on the myths, and characters, we know and love.
Almost all feminist Greek myth retellings are character-driven as authors have chosen to focus on one specific god and their experience, rather than one specific event. I like to think of these as fictional biographies since the authors are usually really fucking good at transporting us readers into the shoes of these goddesses – as if the authors were physically there themselves.
Ariadne by Jennifer Saint
The way this book had me in absolute shambles once the epilogue came around, holy shit. The way that Jennifer Saint writes this book, oh my god I’m obsessed. I listened to the audiobook for this one – and fantasy fanatics will know exactly what I’m talking about – because I was having a hard time with the information dump within the first chapter (as all fantasy novels do) and found it easier to follow along via audiobook compared to my usual paperbacks.
Ariadne is a retelling of the myth of the Minotaur, and offers an alternative perspective to the events of the Minotaur as well as the characters of Theseus, Minos, and Dionysus, and an in-depth look into the relationship dynamic of Dionysus and Ariadne.
Ariadne is the goddess of paths and labyrinths for her assistance to Theseus in helping him slay the Minotaur. Ariadne’s constellation is the Corona constellation and was a wedding gift from Dionysus. If I hadn’t already made it obvious, this adaptation explores the version of Ariadne’s myth where she meets Dionysus and the two of them eventually build their life together.
Now I put this book into this category for Ariadne’s personality, specifically her constantly going against the grain and doing things she’s “not supposed” to do, and that being a key theme throughout the book. She wouldn’t have helped aid Theseus or discovered what truly happened during a dionysian ritual if she did what everyone expected of her.
I gave this a 4.5 rating and you can read my full review in my April 2025 Wrap Up.
Circe by Madeline Miller
Probably the most well-known feminist retelling – if you’ve heard of The Song of Achilles, you’ve definitely heard of Circe as well.
Circe is a minor goddess, and Madeline Miller’s Circe is a retelling of a few myths written from Circe’s perspective.
In this adaptation, we meet Circe when she’s first born, and follow her up until her final days on Aeaea. Circe offers an alternative perspective and provides more of an in-depth perspective into her character and role as a goddess. And while Circe is featured in a myriad of myths, Miller mainly focuses on pre-Trojan war, with a bit of post-war material as well.
I added this book in here simply because it’s such a great introductory read on feminist Greek Mythology retellings. I really loved reading Circe’s journey and how she stepped into her own power. It was really inspiring to have that representation in media of someone who went through so much but still managed to make good from it – even though it wasn’t something she wanted or chose.
I gave Circe a 5 star rating and if you want to read my in-depth thoughts, you can do so in my February 2025 Wrap Up. Dare I say it’s been one of my favourite reads of 2025 – I absolutely loved everything about it and the duality she symbolizes.
You can’t really go wrong in choosing either of these to get your feet wet within the world of feminist Greek Myth retellings. I’ve read both of these within the span of 2-3 months of each other and cannot wait for my brain to forget the details (and once I get through my current TBR, LOL) so I can read both of these again.
Mythology Reimaginings
For those who aren’t well versed in the world of fanfiction, the concept of a reimagining might seem a bit odd, but once you read one I promise the difference between the two make more sense. To understand reimaginings, we first have to understand what a retelling is.
A retelling is when an author tells a story again or in a different way while staying true to the source material, but a reimagining is to reinterpret a story and bring new ideas to source material. Retellings are canonically correct for the majority of the story whereas reimaginings are more often than not majorly canon diverse.
As an example, think of The Hunger Games. A retelling of The Hunger Games would be if Suzanne wrote a book on Peeta’s perspective of the 74th games and would put beloved characters in a new light, or maybe a book from Prim’s perspective set during the same time. However, the reapings themselves are a reimagining of the Minotaur myth – it’s the same concept but told in a different way, it happens for different reasons, and it’s in a different environmental setting.
Essentially, a retelling keeps majority of the plot, characters, and character traits the same while staying true to source material. A reimagining takes these original ideas and might throw the characters into a new world, or give them new personality traits. Maybe the author would have them make different decisions compared to the decisions they canonically made.
Lies We Sing to the Sea by Sarah Underwood
This book is a post-Trojan war and a post-Odyssey reimagining which uses names from Greek Mythology but gives the characters we know and love new arcs and throws them into a new plot. We follow Leto, Mathias, and Melantho who all band together to try and stop the hanging of Penelope’s 12 maids each spring that Poseidon has called for.
Lies We Sing to the Sea is in this category because it’s canon-diverse and dare I say character-diverse as well. Solely because the Leto we meet in this book never gave birth to Artemis and Apollo (as that would have happened long before Odysseus came around) since Leto is around 17 in the book. Additionally, Penelope never had a son named Mathias.
- If you choose to pick up this book, please accept the fact that this is not an Odyssey retelling even though it’s marketed as one, but it does not follow canon events and I hope I’ve stressed that enough in this overview. If you go into reading this with the mindset it is a retelling, you will be heavily disappointed.
If you’re a fanfiction reader, you’d love this because that’s what this book felt like to me in terms of the story structure. And if you’re like me and love to explore new endings to stories we know and love, you’d like this book.
I gave this a 5 star rating because it was like I was reading a fanfic. I always seemed to gravitate towards fanfics that took my beloved characters and threw them into new universes and ate them up, so it was nice have that same feel but with new characters.
And as always if you’d like to read my full thoughts on this book, check out my March 2025 Wrap Up.
There are so many more retellings and reimaginings that I have yet to read – I currently have 25 on my TBR – but with the rate I read at, I am expecting it to take me a while to get through each one. So consider this a living list, one which I plan to update as I dive further into the world of Greek myth retellings.
I hope this guide helps you with choosing your first few Greek mythology retellings/reimaingings and that you end up loving these books as much as I did.
See you in the next!
– julzy
julzy 
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