Rating: 
Summary: A good idea, gone horribly awry
Review: The most disappointing part of this novel is the great potential that it had. The idea of telling the story of the Fall of Troy from the view of the soothsayer and princess Cassandra is an excellent one. However, instead of exploring the myriad of themes that this historical or mythological event sets forth Wolf chooses to narrow her focus onto the tired idea that if women ran the world all would be well. On top of which, the reader is then pedantically beaten over the head with Wolf's OWN essays discussing her work. In order to demonstrate her grasp of the subject matter Wolf accesses esoteric theories about the war such as a romance between Cassandra and Aeneas and the ludicrous assertion that Helen was never really in Troy at all. At the same time, she demonstrates her ignorance of the subject by forgetting that the corpse of Hector was protected by the gods so that it could not be mangled, as she described. Anyone who teaches this book ought to just hand out the ILIAD instead.
Rating: 
Summary: Wonderful, provocative retelling.
Review: This is one of those books I've picked up and put down for more than 12 years, and now that I've read it through, I can't imagine why. The retelling of the story of Cassandra--really of the Iliad, from Cassandra's perspective--is completely compelling and provocative, raising questions about what history is and how it's made, and offering an alternate and completely reasonable view of how the Iliad's events could have happened. Bonus: this volume offers essays providing background on how Christa Wolf came to write the novel--pure gravy for writers, or anyone interested in how stories get born.
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