Exploring Achilles’s Wife: A Review of Judith Starkston’s Historical Fiction

Achilles’s Wife by Judith Starkston
Genre: historical fiction
I read it as a(n): digital ARC
Length: 352 pp 
Her Grace’s rating: 5 stars

Achilles’s Wife by Judith Starkston takes one of those odd little side roads in Greek myth and turns it into a place you actually want to hang around in. This is the retold story of Achilles hidden away on the island of Skyros, disguised as a girl because his mother decides that’s the best way to keep him out of war. He becomes Pyrrha, living among the women of King Lycomedes’s household, where he meets Princess Deidamia (Mia), and promptly complicates both of their lives.

I’ll admit that I really didn’t remember Achilles having a wife at all, and I’ve forgotten a lot of Greek myth in general, to my shame. But I made a point of not looking anything up before reading this, so that it was like reading any brand new novel for the first time. That choice paid off. I got to meet these characters and find out what happens to them without mentally checking boxes or waiting for Famous Myth Moments™ to show up. I also got to see how Starkston used her skill as a writer to play around with the story and its people without unconsciously comparing her story to the classic myth. The tension builds through relationships and daily routines until everything blows up and the truth can’t stay hidden anymore. When Achilles’s identity is revealed, he and Mia are barely able to convince his enraged goddess mother to let them get married instead of wiping out the entire island. Yay! 

What kept pulling me deeper into the book was how realistic it feels. Starkston is very good at making you notice things without waving them in your face. Clothes matter. You feel the difference between fine fabric and rough wool. You notice how people move, how they sit, how they carry themselves. Skyros isn’t just a backdrop where things happen. You can feel how hot, rocky, salty, and alive the island is. I learned accidentally that Rupert Brooke is buried there, just one of those strange historical facts that sticks in your brain and refuses to leave. I can’t remember what I did this morning, but I’ll somehow remember that Rupert Brook is buried on Skyros for the rest of my life.

Later, in the Author’s Note, I learned that Starkston actually stayed on Skyros for the better part of a month so that she could see firsthand the site of this myth and accurately depict it for her readers. Mega researching FTW! That attention to detail pays off in the story. There were moments while reading when I had to remind myself that I was not, in fact, standing in ancient Greece. The research is doing serious work here, but it never turns into a lecture. Also, darn, what a hardship to get to visit an awesome island in the Aegean for a few weeks. Judith, do you need a research assistant? 😁

I also loved the way speech is handled. For example, servants don’t talk like nobles, and that’s not just in reference to their vocabulary. Their grammar isn’t always correct, they use more slang, and you can hear the class differences without being told about them. It adds texture and makes the household feel busy and real and full of overlapping lives instead of neatly arranged characters.

Also? There’s the food. So much food! I honestly wanted to eat my way through this book. Simple picnics with flatbread, cheese, and dried figs sound just as tempting as the more elaborate meals prepared for special occasions. Food becomes comfort, routine, celebration, and sometimes the only reliable pleasure in a life that is shaped by other people’s decisions. I finished more than one chapter thinking that I wanted to cook all the food mentioned in the book. To be fair, food plays a big role in Starkston’s other novels as well as in her own personal life. I know her and am friends with her in real life and have had the pleasure of eating meals that she prepared. Food is important, in history, in literature, and in real life, and this book helps us to remember that. 

There’s also a lot here about what it means to live as a woman in this world, seen through Achilles’s absolute misery at being forced into that role. His desperation to escape life as Pyrrha should feel uncomfortably familiar to modern readers. If living as a woman feels unbearable to him, that reaction alone tells you how constrained and dismissed women are supposed to be. Mia’s growth happens slowly, through frustration, observation, and little bits of well-meant manipulation. She doesn’t suddenly wake up enlightened. She learns the hard way, and that makes her far more believable.

One aspect that really pleased me was how thoughtfully the book handles Achilles’s dysmorphia in his female body. My own experience of body dysmorphia is limited to the usual Western baggage of mirrors, thinking I’m too fat, and impossible patriarchal standards, this portrayal felt careful and sincere. Drawing on what little I know about the lived experiences of trans people, it seemed clear that Starkston was trying to treat this part of the story with respect.

By the end, Achilles’s Wife left me with that extremely satisfying feeling that I had spent time somewhere real, with people who kept living after I closed the book. It doesn’t scream about its themes or beat you over the head with social commentary. It just invites you in, feeds you well, and lets the weight of the story settle where it may. I truly loved it. This is my favorite book that Starkston has written. Highly recommended!