This book was an unexpected surprised. I expected it to be about the moral dilemma that Antigone faces in the Sophocles play, whether she should obey divine law and give her father an honorable burial, or whether she should obey earthly law and not bury him.
Instead we meet “Ann” on a plane going to Crete in search of her twin brother Niklas whom she has not seen for many years. Niklas is a pilot based at the airport in Heraklion, his job giving instruction to students.
But Niklas is not at all happy to see his long-lost sister. There follows some kind of chase as Ann desperately tried to keep up with her brother, a chase that happens in the bowels of the air terminus. But suddenly, doors and floors shift and the next thing we know is that both twins are in the ancient palace at Knossos.
And so we enter the world of Minoan Crete in its final phase, just before the palace was destroyed by fire in 1350 BCE.
This is a fascinating bone-chilling story of what life was like amongst people who both seem exactly like us and utterly alien. We experience power, greed, jealousy as well as kindness and cooperation. We witness ancient rituals, madness and human sacrifice. The book opens up when Ann/Antigone trains to take part in the ancient version of the Olympic Games, which involves bull-taming.
But through it all, one can never relax, because death was around every corner in the ancient world. Finally, a fire in a storeroom destroys the magnificent palace of Knossos and the protagonists flee into the mists of time.
If you love Ancient Greek Myths and are not put off by a touch of Historical Fantasy, this is the book for you! Five Stars.
