Hades' Daughter [Paperback]

I honestly don't know where to start. How about with the characters, not a single one of which is likable or admirable in any way. Each one is invariably one or more of the following: cruel, shallow, power-mad, spoiled, self-centered, whining, manipulative, duplicitous, and vindictive. Brutus, the male "protagonist", rapes his 15-year-old wife Cornelia on their wedding night, smacks her around repeatedly (including once while she is in labor with their son), and cheats on her with Genvissa, a blasphemous priestess who has sucked dry her own goddess in her lust for power. Lovely. We're supposed to feel OK about this, because Cornelia forgives him and moons around after him regardless. Oh yeah, she's an inspiring heroine for women everywhere.

Then there's the plot, such as it is, a jumbled mish-mash of Greek and pre-Celtic mythological references used to support an utterly transparent and preposterous storyline that involves a disinherited patricidal Trojan (Brutus) and a spoiled and self-centered Greek princess (Cornelia) who travel to what will eventually become Britain to establish a new Troy. They're led there by Genvissa, an evil Llangarlian priestess (Llangarlia must be the silliest fantasy name I've yet to encounter) who wants access to the power Brutus wields over the Troy Game, an all-but-extinct form of labyrinth magic. Intrigued yet? Oh wait, there's more. Fathers rape daughters, sons kill mothers (and those are the *good* guys), and there is quite possibly the most disgusting and graphic miscarriage scene I have ever read. (No one who has ever given birth, or ever intends to, should read this scene. Do the words "ruptured placenta" mean anything to you?)

I don't mind characters that are a mix of good and bad; Douglass' previous hero, Axis, did some pretty crappy things while he was saving the world and didn't feel too darn bad about it. But there's a difference between a character who starts flawed and has to redeem themselves, or one who has to do some rotten things for the greater good, and a character who's just a jerk. I literally wanted to wash my hands when I set this book down. Don't waste the money.

I'll not summarize the plot here, except to say that "Hades' Daughter" is a historical fantasy built around the relationship of three antagonistic major characters and one villain. The three antagonists also form a romantic triangle, of sorts. The heroine has a love/hate relationship with the hero, who is in love with the third. There are enough hints given by Douglass that the hero and heroine really should be together, but one or the other always manages to say or do the wrong thing and make the other mad. At times, reading the book was like watching a soap opera where you want to figuratively bash the lead characters over the head because they're making so many dumb mistakes.

Frankly, I didn't find any of the three major characters particularly likeable. Brutus, the hero, is best described by his name--brutal. He conquers the heroine's father's kingdom, forces her into marriage and rapes her, and then obsesses about another woman. Why Cornelia, the heroine, would ever care about him is beyond me, but she does. Genvissa, her rival, is manipulative and power-hungary. There were other minor characters that were more likable, but for me, the unpleasantness of the main characters destroyed much of the book's pleasure.

That's a shame, because in many ways I like the way Douglass writes. She has the ability write long, involving stories with interesting motifs. The idea of magical mazes underlying cities is an intriguing one, for example, and Douglass can move a narrative along with good descriptions. I also liked the idea of the same characters interacting again and again in different lives. In the end, I'll probably read the next volume, but I'll wait for the paperback.