I approached this book with caution as anything dealing with Roman Empire scares the living daylights out of me. However, I was pleasantly surprised by the author's ability to grip and hold my attention in a positive way from start to finish. Jane Alison has managed to find the perfect balance between gory parts (some of the story takes place in Rome, after all) and the hauntingly beautiful story of Ovid and Xenia.

P.S. It's a shame that Goodreads doesn't offer half stars as rating options because this was more like 3,5 stars to me. There must be something between "really liked" and just plain "liked"...

It was a passionate story told poetically.

Ovid III

Yet another book about Ovid, though this volume examines the circumstances in Rome just before his exile to the Black Sea. Alison tells a story of love and hate, that inspires Ovid's "Medea." Much better on the other side of Ovid's life - his love of women - but not as finely written as Ransmayr or Malouf.

Third book for October's readathon.

This one's for a class -- the Batman was too, actually. This one was for historical fiction. I'll be interested to see why it's been picked for the course. For me it was such a heated, smothering, smouldering book. The idea is fascinating, transfiguring Ovid's life and even his disgrace and death into art, as the Ovid of the story transfigures Xenia into art.

Unsubtle, in places, though. The prose is so lush, practically dripping with adjectives, adverbs; and Xenia, as a name? Evoking both the word xenos, stranger, and xenia, guest-friendship... and I'm not entirely sure the author thought about that latter meaning, because I can't really square it with the plot.

It's sort of... lovely and repellant, in the same way as the character Xenia is lovely and repellant. Overall, glad to have read it, despite my ambivalent feelings toward it.

I read this for a class on Coursera about historical fiction. In my opinion, this book is not historical fiction. I didn’t care for the story or writing. I was truly interested in learning about Ovid. I didn’t. What a bizarre choice for the course and in general.

This was so so. I read it because it's about Ovid. It tries to answer WHY Ovid was sent into exile by Augustus and in that it's somewhat original and interesting, however I felt the writing was fine but not great. The book felt like it was trying to keep a secret from us, the readers, but the secret wasn't all that significant. I would have put it out there from the start so that I didn't seem tricksy.

Not nearly as good and interesting as Christoph Ransmayr's The Last World. That is a truly decadent and rich read.

Jane has a way with words, and I'm not just saying that because she is my friend.

The girl on that cover looks like Jennifer Lawrence

This is an historical novel based on a reimagining of Ovid, his exile from Rome, and the disappearance of what is generally thought of as possibly his greatest work, the play Medea. That work has disappeared from history – only two lines remain. Jane Alison, who studied classics, writes her book based on three characters, Ovid the writer, Xenia the witch (and stand in for Medea) and Julia, the Emperor Augustus’ granddaughter.

There are some technical issues with the book - it is a first novel. There is too little dialogue and too many repeated descriptions, but overall, the imagined story is a good one. There is some art and magic, fantasy, ancient history and wonderful (albeit repetitive) descriptions of Rome in ancient times.

If you are a fan of Ovid, Classical Antiquity or Ancient Rome you will enjoy this novel.

I'd say 2.5-3 stars. The writing is excellent. The story-- meh. It's more or less boring.

First time I have ever liked Ovid. Who's to know?

A very poetic view, more about the language than the plot, but a lovely book explaining how Ovid's play "Medea" came to be lost through the treachery of Augustus' daughter, Julia. This novel confronts the idea of artist as copier, as Augustus must model all of his characters on real life examples, and he chooses the unfortunate innocent, Xenia, to model his Medea on. Will he push her all the way to infanticide, or will his love for her win out? Why is he exiled from Rome? These, and questions of the artist's immortality, are explored in lush language and gorgeous surroundings.