Helen of Troy by Margaret George

Two years ago, on my birthday, I picked up the book "Helen of Troy" by Margaret George. I was feverishly reading through three other novels, two of which I had reviewed, one of which I gave a short preview, and a summary on the relevancy of the novel. After last week, putting aside my other books, I read the book Helen of Troy, and if you've read my prior acknowledgements on this author, I liked it not only because I like Margaret George, but I like the mystery that this piece of history is shrouded in....very much like a mystic shaman of ancestral tribes, Helen of Troy is only fact to that time, and to those who were there to witness that generation.
The story of Helen of Troy, formerly of Sparta, is a story that we not only know by heart, but it is enriched by our own tellings, especially in America. Helen's desire for her true love Paris may be quested out these days on a Jerry Springer/Maury talk show, but her tale is one that is prone to both anger, frustration, and common sense. Menealus, the character that we are either to despise, or empathize with, is not either a hero or villain, he's actually not much of anything, but is such a crucial part of the tale....why? These days Menealus would be the high-school angst teen that screams hopeless romantic babbling towards the balcony of his "true love" and threatens to kill himself if he cannot be with the hot chick that rather date the jock.

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I'm not picking on the story, I think it's a great story, but I know that this was to be a challenge for George to do, after her earlier release of Mary, Called Magdalene, I knew she had to do something to get me out of that rut, it was not even like a real Margaret George experience. Now, Helen of Troy felt like a Margaret George novel, it vitalized my faith in her writing. Is this her best work yet? In my honest opinion, I still feel, in my heart that her most accurately descriptive, although over-dramatized piece has to be "The Memoirs of Cleopatra" this was the first book I've read that was written by George, and the third she's ever written. That behemoth of a novel is to me, the standard George novel. I compare all her other works to that novel, even the earlier works that are The Autobiography of Henry VIII, another great novel I did a short review on that demands to be read, and Mary Queen of Scots and the Isle, a great read that is done a little differently from her first person narratives.
Back on subject, Helen of Troy is that sort of novel I would not recommend unless I was sure it was worth both the time and effort for the average reader to take-on, and it is! This novel is great, and if you're a George fan, you'll love her work. I'm not really into the romance novels, and I just could not really connect with Helen on a deep level as I could've with Cleo, because she sounded like a drama queen teen-aged angst, high-school grad cheerleader, but in a sense, that's sort of what she was, even in the stories by Homer (Iliad, Oddessy, Aneid) Even George left the mythological parts of the story in, but instead of showing the Gods on Olympus, she instead told it through the perspective of the characters, she explains this in the afterward, because many readers, as well I, assumed this to be a close-to-fact retelling of Helen, a way we've never read of her before. We do get the telling of Helen's life in a new way, but we also get more fiction than historical.
I am partial to George, and I may take it too easy on her work at times, but I think that this bulk of a novel *around 620 pages in the hardcover standard print issue* could've been a little better, what novel is perfect in the first edition? That's why even "Ender's Game" has several editions, with new prefaces every reprint with "added chapters" Preface should just be French for: "I fucked up the first time, so I'm going to add nonsense into a great novel just to feel better about myself" or the new hip thing authors do: "Introduction to the new addition" I see that and tear the pages out of the spine. George seems to rush the middle of the second part, as if to spare time, but it's a book, time is always on your side, and making a hundred years span thirty pages can be done well, but George instead cannot allow twenty years to span three hundred pages because she's telling intricate details on Helen using a privy, sorry, but that did piss me off a bit, the most menial tasks that all humans do become enshrined in the midst of the voyage to Troy, and hence we lose decent story over way too much description. I guess if you're the daughter of a God, wiping your ass is more important than oh, say twenty years of war! Granted, it was not about a privy, but because of the load of characters, and that part about the birthday party for the Trojan queen were boring, and long-winded like this run-on sentence. Catch my drift?



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I admire details, they're like that little extra effort of a school paper, like making a colorful cover sheet with a powerpoint image of an Delicious Red apple with a worm poking out with a graduate's hat on for the teacher to giggle over.....but it can also look like you're sucking up to the reader, which I've seen in two latest books by Ms. George. The subjects of the past two novels again were more fiction than history, but not only is it hard to chronicle a life that may never have happened, it is also a task for experienced writers to fill those missing gaps responsibly, and Ms. George gives an A- effort, although she's an A+ writer. I love Ms. George's works, and I'm trying to be a tad harsh, but this irritates the hell out of me, and I do hope that Ms. George's next work on the mid life of Elizabeth I will be astounding. Ms. George, keep up the work, for it is great, and I am grateful that you continue to write such novels that inspire.