As it happens, my IRL book club is the one that gave me a kick in the pants to start on all those Greek retellings that I’ve been seeing in the blogosphere by picking two of them as book club reads. Stone Blind is one of them and since it was listed first, I decided to pick it up.

I went into Stone Blind well… blind because I didn’t bother to read the synopsis before borrowing. As far as I can tell, Stone Blind is a retelling of the myths around how Athena (or Athene, as she’s called in the book) was born, the creation of Medusa, and the quests of Perseus. The story is told through a variety of viewpoints and we get an in-depth look into the world of the Olympians.

And I have to admit, I didn’t quite like this, mostly because many of the characters seemed… well so childish. The book doesn’t dwell on any one character for too long, but for the most part, the gods seem to be vacuous and petty; even Athena, goddess of wisdom, reminds me of a petulant child. Medusa is interesting, as the only mortal on an island with two immortal sisters, but we barely get to know her before she is raped by Poseidon. I could feel her sister’s love for her, that comes through beautifully through the prose, but Medusa’s sacrificial choices make no sense to me.

The only character that I felt acted believably, and who was somewhat sympathetic, was Perseus. He’s impulsive but also confounded by the gods and how they act. Honestly, I could see myself reacting like him for most of the book.

And this likeability of Perseus brings me to my main disappointment with the book. I assume we’re supposed to see the gods as these childish things. I also thing we’re supposed to see Perseus as rather stupid, a hero who doesn’t deserve to be one, mostly because there’s a chapter or two where the narrator insults Perseus. My impression of this book is that it’s supposed to be about the injustice done towards Medusa and to refute the myths that paint her as a monster.

My gripe is that I didn’t like how it was done. Is the only way to make Medusa sympathetic to make everyone else unlikeable and to try and get us to dislike Perseus as well? I don’t think so. I think it is possible to get the reader to inhabit Medusa’s world, to see her as likeable as not-monstrous, but to also see every other character similarly. Plus, I am still unconvinced by the portrayal of Athena and some of the other gods – I think Zeus was pretty true to how he is traditionally portrayed, Hera was sadly let down by being shown as only vengeful, and I still don’t understand why Haynes chose to make Athena act like an overstressed child who only knows how to whine.

I suppose some might argue that the original tales of the Olympians do show them as capricious and petty, basically humans with superpowers that are inexplicably worshipped and admired. There’s a point there, but putting down all other characters to make Medusa the good woman doesn’t refute the myth, it merely inverts it while keeping to the same power structures. I found myself quite annoyed while reading the book of how I felt the author was trying to direct me to think. I am unconvinced by the way the gods are written not because they aren’t true to the myth, but because it feels like they are mere puppets in the hands of the author. In the case of Athena, I really don’t understand her last decision precisely because of the way she’s been portrayed throughout the whole book. It’s at odds with what she chose and that is the part that is unconvincing to me.

For the most part, the language used here flows well and is evocative. The narration falters a bit when it’s trying to make a point – For instance, Andromeda’s chapters sound like a know-it-all teenager (which again, makes me feel like this book is populated with characters who are mentally teenagers and children) but generally works.

Overall, I found myself disappointed with Stone Blind. While I wasn’t too sure what I wanted when I started the book, I know that it wasn’t quite what I got. It feels like the book wanted to be fresh and original, but instead it chose to focus only on the weak points of the gods and I find that makes the retelling rather shallow – it’s like the original, only inverted.