Author Madeline Miller to feature in Spokane County Library District Online Authors Series

Madeline Miller, the New York Times bestselling author of Greek mythological retellings “Circe” and “The Song of Achilles,” is virtually coming to Spokane.

She will headline “On Retelling Greek Classics: An Exploration of the Modern Epics with Madeline Miller,” a webinar hosted by the Spokane County Library District as part of their Online Authors Series.

On Thursday, Miller will talk with the audience about “her body of work and her process in retelling Greek classics into modern epics in fiction,” according to the district’s event website.

As it is a live event, the audience can ask Miller questions in the chat, said Erin Dodge, a communication specialist at the library district.

Viewers can learn about Miller’s writing craft and knowledge about the myths’ source material. The author attended Brown University where she earned both a bachelor’s and master’s degrees in classics.

Her popular books tell the famous stories of “The Iliad” and “The Odyssey” from different perspectives than the source material.

“They’re based on Greek mythology, but it’s taken from a different character point of view than most of mythology is told,” Dodge said. “So ‘Circe,’ I think there’s very few lines where she’s mentioned in the original and this book is completely her perspective, so it’s a really interesting take on these classics.

“The Song of Achilles,” Miller’s 2011 debut novel, tells the story of the mythic Greek hero, Achilles, from the perspective of his lover and sworn companion, the exiled prince Patroclus.

The novel follows the pair through their youth, friendship, relationship and experiences as warriors fighting in the Trojan War. Their epic romance risks the wrath of the gods and fate itself.

In “Circe,” which was the 2019 Spokane Is Reading selection, the titular daughter of Helios is exiled to a secluded island by Zeus, where she hones her magic and becomes her true self as the goddess of witchcraft, while crossing paths with famous Greek heroes like the Minotaur and Odysseus.

“I also was really frustrated at how little airtime she gets in ‘The Odyssey,’” Miller said in a 2019 interview ahead of Spokane Is Reading. “It’s a very, very small cameo role, and I really wanted her to have more. Every time I would read ‘The Odyssey,’ I would think, ‘Can’t we just stay with Circe? Do we have to keep focusing on Odysseus here?’

Circe’s growing power “can transform rivals into monsters and menace the gods themselves,” according to the SCLD website.

“They’re both wonderful books,” Dodge said. “I couldn’t recommend them more highly.”

Dodge recommends the event to any reader, teens and up.

Viewers can register for the free event at libraryc.org/scld/41327/register to receive an email linking to the webinar. The event will need to be viewed separately by each person, there will not be a streaming event at a library location.

If Greek retellings are not your taste, Dodge said, community members should keep up with the SCLD Online Authors Series.

“We get genres and authors talking about different things from cookbooks, celebrity cookbooks, to self help, to financial literacy, to great novels, fantasy novels and romance novels,” Dodge said. “It’s the whole gamut of reading. So anybody who Greek literature or a retelling of Greek classics isn’t your thing, you’ll find another author that has something that would be interesting to attend one of these online author talks.”