#classical retellings

The Wolf Den by Elodie Harper

‘May men fall to me as this offering falls to you, Greatest Aphrodite. May I know love’s power, if never it’s sweetness’

I have been wanting to read this book for a long time now, and I am happy to say that it did not disappoint!

The Wolf Den, set in Pompeii’s Lunpar, is the first in a trilogy of novels reimagining the lives of women who have been overlooked in history.

Here, we follow Amara through her journey as slave, sold into prostitution after the death of her father plunged her family into poverty, we get to know a woman who is smart, resourceful and willing to do whatever it takes to earn her freedom. Through Amara, we also get to meet the other women at the brothel with her. Each of these women are as well written as Amara, with compelling and complicated histories, and it is not a hardship to fall in love with them in this story.

Harper has managed to navigate the stories of these women, and the brutal lives they have to live quite brilliantly, and with great sensitivity. While the story is set around a brothel, and is about the lives of women who are ‘working’ as prostitutes, the sex scenes are not over the top or grotesque. It is very much a novel where it’s a woman writing for women, with an awareness of exactly what stories need to be told.

I would say it’s a ‘medium paced’ story, but hard to put down once you start reading it! It only took me two days, that that too because I had to stop reading while I was at work, and to sleep

If you enjoyed Circe, Silence of the Girls and Penelopiad, basically if you enjoy classical retellings with a focus on the voices of women, this is the book for you!

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️