Title Heracles' Bow Series --- Author Madeline Miller Cover Art --- Publisher 2012 First Printing 2012 Category Mythology Warnings None Website madelinemiller.com Main Characters Philoctetes Main Elements Mythology

---

Miller takes minor characters from the Greek Myths and weaves wonderously poignant tales and gives voices to those otherwise unheard. Philoctetes was a friend of Heracles and inherited his bow. After Heracles death, Philoctetes is bound to help Menelaus retrieve Helen from the Trojans. However, right at the start of the journey, he is bitten by a snake and abandoned on an island.

But this tale is not so much about those events but rather Philoctetes dealing with the grief of Heracles passing, and while he doesn't particularly want to go to war, perhaps it would help get his mind off things, so to speak. The tale is short, so there isn't much to say, but that it was beautiful.

And that I'm convinced that I would read anything Miller writes. I hope she continues to retell the ancient tales with her own particular twist.