I love Steven Pressfield's writing. His writing is rich in historical fact and speculation based on the best knowledge we have. He can bring the distant past into brilliant life in the best of his books.
"Gates of Fire" was an amazing book. And while enjoyed "Last of the Amazon's" it never soared like other books he has written. I found it interesting and well written and would recommend it but it is not his best work in my opinion. But still a good read!

Αυτό το βιβλίο μιλάει για την σχέση του Θησέα με την αμαζόνα Αντιοπη. Υπάρχει καταγεγραμενο από τον Πλούταρχο ότι οι Αμαζόνες επιτέθηκαν στην Αθήνα κάποια στιγμή. Επειδή μόνο ο Πλούταρχος το αναφέρει πολλοί το αμφισβητούν σαν γεγονός.
Ο Πρεσσσφιλντ χρησιμοποιεί αυτό το γεγονός για να πει μια ιστορία. Μια ιστορία του τι έγινε πριν και τι μετά από αυτό τον πόλεμο.
Καθώς ξεκινάει το βιβλίο υπάρχει μια ορμή που είναι κυρίαρχη στους χαρακτήρες και στην δράση. Υπάρχει πολυ δράση αλλά μετά κάπου ξεκινάνε οι μάχες και η βία παίζει μεγαλύτερο ρόλο ακόμα και από τους χαρακτήρες. Πολλή λεπτομερεια των μαχών από το τι φορούσαν μέχρι με ποιον ακριβώς τρόπο πέθαιναν.
Δυστυχώς δεν υπάρχουν πολλά βιβλία που να μας προσφέρουν μια ματιά στην ζωή των Αμαζόνων και ακόμα και αυτό το μυθιστορημα ενώ ξεκινάει με ωραίες περιγραφές αναλώνεται στις μάχες και τον πόλεμο. Μιλάει όμως και για την κοινωνία τους και τα ήθη και έθιμα τους. Ο συγγραφέας περιγράφει την σχέση τους με τα άλογα και τους άλλους λαούς αλλά και τους άνδρες.

Πρόκειται για ένα ιστορικό μυθιστόρημα που πλέκει τον μύθο των Αμαζόνων με ιστορικά πρόσωπα και γεγονότα. Οι καλές περιγραφές των σκληρών μαχών μπλέκονται με ιστορίες αγάπης που εξελίσσονται παράλληλα.

Ωστόσο, υπήρχαν πολλές, αναλυτικότατες περιγραφές που κούραζαν τόσο από το πλήθος των πληροφοριών, όσο κι από την καθυστέρηση στην εξέλιξη της ιστορίας, ώστε να φθάνουν να γίνονται χαοτικές. Επίσης, όταν το διάβαζα είχα την αίσθηση ότι δεν έχει δομηθεί επαρκώς η αφήγηση της ιστορίας, η οποία γινόταν από την Χαριτώ και μέσα σε αυτήν εγκιβωτιζόταν η αφήγηση της Αμαζόνας Σελήνης και του Αθηναίου Δάμωνα. Παρότι ήταν ένας ενδιαφέρον τρόπος να μας παρουσιάσει ο συγγραφέας την ιστορία, η προσπάθεια αυτή κάπου χάθηκε, καθώς δεν έγινε μια ουσιαστική διαφοροποίη��η του λόγου βάσει της προσωπικότητας του κάθε χαρακτήρα και το μόνο που άλλαζε ήταν η σκοπιά της συνεχιζόμενης αφήγησης (π.χ. στρατόπεδο Αμαζόνων/ στρατόπεδο Αθηναίων). Αυτό είχε σαν αποτέλεσμα να γίνει η αφήγηση επιφανειακή και κάπως αδιάφορη, αφού στην ουσία δεν είχε ενδιαφέρον ποιός ήταν ο αφηγητής, εφόσον κι οι τρεις αφηγούνταν με τον ίδιο πάνω-κάτω τρόπο.

Συνολικά, σ'αρκετά σημεία ο λόγος ήταν εντυπωσιακός και κρατούσε το ενδιαφέρον, αλλά σ' άλλα παρουσίαζε μια επαναληψιμότητα, μονοτονία και υπερβολική ανάλυση που κούραζε.

Δεν μπορώ να πω ότι ευχαριστήθηκα το συγκεκριμένο βιβλίο, αλλά ούτε ότι δε μου άρεσε. Είναι το πρώτο βιβλίο του Pressfield που διαβάζω (κ διάβασα ότι δεν είναι το καλύτερο του) οπότε ελπίζω τα επόμενα που θα διαβάσω να ανατρέψουν ευχάριστα την τωρινή εντύπωση.

Intriguing

First of the all, I did enjoy the idea of this setting and story plot. Even I do agree with many reviews about how choppy the beginning was...as the story progress. It turned out to be a badass. Even if the majority focus on the war itself. I would love to see some more about Selene’s stay in Athens. In the end, I was sad to see this went out with such silence and falling into shadows.

Having heard good reports previously of Steven Pressfield's writing, I have to say that my overwhelming feeling here was disappointment. So many different aspects were poorly judged and spoiled the book for me to enjoy it terribly much. Firstly, the form of narration was far too convoluted and knotty. The book reads as a story within a story within a story - Bones as a grandmother telling the story of her adventures as a child, and during her adventures her uncle Damon recounts his own adventures as a young man and it's these which make up the main focus of most of the book. Not only is this incredibly convoluted, but you already know how the main story, Damon's tale, is going to end because of the situation and circumstances already described by Bones as she takes you into the story. This takes away all the tension from what should be the exciting climax of the book - the height of the siege of Athens.

It is also problematic because the book skips between narrators constantly, the four narrators being Bones, Damon, Selene and Elias. And this highlights another problem. The characters all feel very flat and one-dimensional, with little depth or fleshing out to them, and very little understanding of their deep motivations and reasons, their personalities. So when you shift between narrator there is virtually no change in tone or style, making it difficult for the reader to place where we are and what's meant to be happening - this is spelt out for us in each chapter, and that's the only way you can keep track of what's going on.

Pressfield takes a good stab at imagining the culture of a people about which there is very little if any definitive evidence, and may indeed be only myth and legend. However, this quickly becomes overcomplicated too and thus far too confusing. For example, the idea that Amazon warriors become organised into groups of three bond-sisters, called a "trikona", is an interesting one, although there's no evidence for it. However, Pressfield then goes further and has it that each Amazon is a concurrent member of three different "trikonae". The relationships within these three different groups are highly complex and regulated. It's simply just one example of many concepts that Pressfield comes up with that are confusing, lengthy, difficult to understand and not fully explained. Instead of being concise, clear, defined and precise, Pressfield only succeeds in confusing matters. Apart from the fact that his suggestions of Amazon culture have no basis in historical fact, their exact purpose within Amazon society in the novel is not clear either and it is a sign of poor writing to include elements in the story or indeed a society that basically have no apparent reason for having arisen or being in place.

The use of modernisms is immensely annoying throughout and constantly ruins the setting of the story. Anachronisms include Pressfield's imposition of modern sensibilities on his tale, writing Theseus as the pioneering leader of an Athenian democracy, a system which would not become established in Athens for another seven or eight centuries, instead of the autocratic king that he was in Greek mythology. Further, Pressfield is inconsistent in his naming practises throughout. Some characters are named by their actual Hellenistic name, for example, Damon, Selene, Theseus, and Antiope, but other characters are named by the translation of the meaning of their name, for example Bones, Ant, and Grey-Eyes.

I found the premise that Eleuthera could just lie about Antiope being kidnapped, when there were hundreds of witnesses who could clearly see she was in love with Theseus and had fled of her own will, and the entire Amazon nation just accept that, ridiculous. Also it just didn't feel plausible that all these other nations would throw their lot in with the Amazon cause, that Eleuthera would even be able to convince them to do so - not in a time of brutality and personal agenda. What would be in it for these allied nations? They'd probably consider it far easier just to march into the totally abandoned Amazon homeland whilst the Amazons moved their entire population to besiege Athens, and take the spoils from added territory bordering their own. Furthermore, besieging Athens is also not a realistic proposition for the Amazons either. They know that it is a walled city, that it can hold out for months. They have no siege technology whatsoever and no knowledge whatsoever of waging a siege, relying on an army of fast cavalry on the steppes of their homeland. Having swept through hostile territory without removing the enemies at their back, they would be cut off from the supplies needed to feed such a massive cavalry army. Simply put, this would have been military insanity. As a historian specialising in this period, I didn't buy it one bit.

Leaving aside the fact for the moment that the entire venture of the Amazons besieging Athens is completely ridiculous and unfeasible, the siege takes up the vast majority of the book and drags on for ages. The success of the Amazons' style of fighting throughout the siege makes no sense, and the scene where Antiope rides out and not only cuts down about 50 people but all of those the prime warriors of the enemy, without suffering exhaustion or crippling or fatal injury, is just unbelievable. The Amazons are written as overpoweringly better warriors than the Athenians, and they cut down so many that by the time the Amazons are beaten back, I just couldn't quite believe that the Athenians had enough fighters left to convincingly win the conflict!

Overall, the book is beset by confused narration, total lack of characterisation, overly complex postulations, confusing and repetitive scenes which don't make sense, and use of modernisms and inconsistency over names. The dialogue is also stilted and clichéd. Admittedly it could definitely be worse. Pressfield's command of language and grammar is more competent that some authors I've had the misfortune to read, however he needlessly complicates his language and doesn't understand how to effectively employ sophisticated language and grammar patterns, creating the effect of writing that is confusing, pompous, or painfully laughable; at times all three at once! At least Pressfield doesn't resort to stock characterisations of evil bad guys or include incidences of magic in what is supposed to be plausibly history. For those reasons, "Last of the Amazons" lifts itself above truly atrocious examples of literature, but Pressfield has missed the mark here.

Initially it took me a while to get into the story and once I did, I couldn't put it down.

I believe this was partly due to the language, and unfamiliar names (Latin/Greek), etc. used during the timeframe of this story (circa 1250 BCE).

Other reviews provide an in-depth synopsis, so I won't duplicate here.

Decades ago, Mary Renault, an amazing writer and historian of Ancient Greece, set her sights well before the classical world to that of the heroic, telling the late Bronze Age tale of Theseus in "The King Must Die" and "Bull From the Sea", arguably two of the finest historical fiction works ever written, certainly concerning that period.

Of course, Steve Pressfield is himself a monumental writer, whose "Gates of Fire" is considered a towering work of both the novelist's craft and the meticulous analysis of the battle of Thermopylae. So, if someone was going to revisit the great king of Athens and mythical father of its democracy, who better? Indeed, who better to tackle the mythical Amazons and Theseus's wild affair and disastrous marriage to their war-queen, Antiope?

As it turns out, lots of people. Lots and lots and lots of people.

There is so much that almost works in this book, woven in with so much crap it is hard to know where to start.

From a narrative point of view, the novel is a series of first person chronicles, in two separate timelines: the past, surrounding the Athenian voyage to Amazonia, Thesus's encounter with Antiope, their marriage and the Amazon sack of Athens; and the present, which involves a new expedition setting out after Selene an escaped Amazon captive, who is herself one of the viewpoint characters in the past timeline. Both of these are set in the framework of another third person narrative, "Bones", a young Greek girl tutored by the captive Selene, relaying these events to some future reader.

Did you get all that? It's three first person narrations, set inside a first person narration. Except sometimes those narrators include long reports from other people, which are in turn first person. It's a bold, complex choice, and it fails, miserably. The narrative voice of Bones differs only marginally from Selene, which differs almost not at all from Damon, and I periodically had to double-check at the start of a new chapter to see if the narrator had changed. This was a major drawback of the work -- the characters don't feel distinct.

That problem is made worse by the pseudo archaic language (common in historical fiction), combined with a reliance on passive-voice descriptive passages. We are TOLD about Athens, we are TOLD about the almost absurdly complex social relationships of the Amazons, but we are not SHOWN them. That is a failure of Creative Writing 101, and Pressfield knows better, but gets away with it because he is a major author, and this makes it all feel "Old Timey" or something. (If so, I'd rather read Herodotus.) Sadly, that is then made even more jarring when it is punctuated by modern dialogue like "That's the ticket!" and "It was smackbang clear" or "They were shitfaced and having fun." (no, really).

The first chapters of the novel drag, then are filled with some truly great and exciting moments, with some inspired prose. An example:

“The savages came out of nowhere, seizing three of our mates on the strand. Theseus ordered attack, but as soon as the ships entered the cove, small craft by the hundreds launched by the tree line, slinging darts and fire lances. These were Saii and Androphagi, Man-Eaters."

Cannibals, a chilling lake of tar (which is set on fire), a mounted duel between Antiope and a Scythian hero -- all exciting and interesting moments. And the entire third quarter of the book is just one prolonged siege. But it never overcomes the narration problem, and the real problem is that these characters have no soul -- Thesus is seen through others eyes, and mostly just as a foil to laud the brilliance of Antiope. Even this is not done effectively -- there is nothing *wrong* with Thesus, his bride is just better at everything. Bones as the Ur-narrator has no personality to speak of and Selene is a cypher to relay the character of Amazonia, yet oddly seems little different than her Greek-lover Damon. The faux historical chronicle style of the narration keeps the characters at arm's length, and although we are told this person loves that person nothing really suggests it.

In short, I cared nothing about anyone, and their deaths were just words on a page. The only exception was Antiope herself, who is clearly the star of Pressfield's tale, yet is only seen through other's eyes, is off-stage for at least half of the book, and dies well before its end.

So, there is the literary critique . But Pressfield is known for his depiction of Thermopylae and his meticulous recreation of Antiquity, so how does this fare as HISTORICAL fiction? Well, clearly the Bronze Age is not his expertise.

Firstly, to be fair, he must create the Amazon's whole-cloth, as he admits, so by default they are no more real than Robert E. Howard's Picts are the real pre-Celtic people of Scotland, or George RR Martin's Dothraki are Mongols...which is good because they feel no more real, either. Pressfield's Amazons are a mix of Scythian, Native American (I would guess Comanche or Apache) and 13th c CE Mongol, and this would have been pretty fun and interesting if the depiction had been consistent. But it's not. We learn the Amazon animist creation myth, but then are presented with the tal Kyrte, as they call themselves, as sky-worshipping monotheists who swear by God (as opposed to "the gods") and are contemptuous of the Greeks and their pantheon....right until we are taught all of the various rites they perform to Ares, Artemis and Zeus. And no, this isn't a Greek relating those rites to their own gods, this is an Amazon explain them to us. The world-building inconsistency is glaring and continuous.

There is also the problem that Pressfield's Amazons might as well be DC comics, because they are just as superhuman, in what is supposed to be historical fiction, not historical fantasy: Hurling 10 lb discuses in battle from horseback, using their fearsome, double-bladed axes one-handed with such strength they can cleave iron armour (more on that in a moment), performing mounted feats -- such as hanging one one handed while being dragged, and doing a vault by that arm back into the saddle -- that are better suited to Legolas in the film version of Lord of the Rings. It goes from impressive to ludicrous; no more realistic than the Persian army in Frank Miller's "300", but far less honest about what it is trying to portray.

Finally, this a war novel, and it fails miserably in depicting late Bronze Age warfare. Pressfield has already displayed a weird mishmash of mixing modern and archaic language, so perhaps he can be forgiven for describing the armies in terms of squads, corps, brigades and battalions -- utterly meaningless terms in the period. But what is astounding is how little understanding he has of warfare in the period. The Greeks fight in phalanxes straight of the Hellenic period, while the Amazons and their allied army of nomads have a level of siegecraft that would have made the Hittites -- the military superpower of the period -- boggle. Likewise, while it is true that iron weapons and armour were in use by the 14th century BCE, it was still rare -- again more commonly in the hands of the Hittites -- and bronze remained the preeminent material, not least because until one can make a reliable steel, the only advantage to iron is that it is more easily produced than an alloy requiring rare tin. This is need for tin and discovery for how to purify iron is a MAJOR economic, military and technological tale of the era, and Pressfield misses it entirely. Not only are the Greeks armed and armoured mostly in iron, so mysteriously enough, are the Amazons, Scyths, Getai, etc. Of course they are -- they can do EVERYTHING BETTER.

Honestly, by the point I got to the final 50 pages, which are probably the best in the novel, it no longer mattered. I was past caring.

This isn't a story about Theseus and Antiope in the waning days of the Bronze Age. It isn't even a story about the Bronze Age, in its trappings, it culture, anything. It is a fantasy novel in a parallel world that has elements of Greek civilization from across seven or eight centuries. And that might have been OK, if Pressfield had made me to do one thing to care one iota about most of the characters. I don't know how you make a tale of Theseus, Antiope and the Amazon siege of Athens boring, but somehow Last of the Amazons does.

I'd rather rewatch "Wonder Woman", whose Amazons were both far more likeable, and at least as believable.

The story of the final days of the Amazons. told from various pints of view. Recounts the how the Greek Theseus took an amazon queen bride, the epic battle that led too, and how that led to the eventual fall of the Amazons. the author also uses it to pit the world views of The amazons--of connection to nature and a communitarian view against the materialistic, individualistic and democratic world view of the Greeks. It is not just the end of a tribe, but of a period of history and a way of living, and the ascendancy of the other. Full of Pressfield's usual attention to gory battlefield detail.

A great story, once you get about halfway through, but with atrocious writing.

I read this book years ago but it is very prescient today with the release of the Wonder Woman film. For anyone looking for a great back story to life as an Amazon. Then check out the warrior women graves uncovered by archeologists which prove these women really existed (albeit without all the super powers attributed to them)

Audiobook narration was unbearably slow, like they were pretending to be ancient sages. Story was decent, but I would have enjoyed reading much more than listening.

This is a fantasy book loosely based on ancient historical events.

It grabbed me. I could not put the book down and read it in two days. I enjoyed the action sequences and came to care deeply about the characters.

Similar to Tolkien, the author persuades you that you are reading history. And similar to Tolkien, Pressfield makes you ache at the loss of something irreplaceable and beautiful.

Imagine the Elves in “The Lord of The Rings,” were defeated and driven to extinction instead boarding ships to Valinor. This is how “Last of the Amazons” makes you feel.

Ultimately “Last of the Amazons” is a very sad book.