A bold and captivating new novel of ancient Greece, from the
celebrated, award-winning author of The Golden Mean.
Pythias is her father''s daughter, with eyes his exact shade of
unlovely, intelligent grey. A slave to his own curiosity and
intellect, Aristotle has never been able to resist wit in
another--even in a girl child who should be content with the
kitchen, the loom and a life dictated by the womb. And oh his
little Pytho is smart, able to best his own students in debate and
match wits with a roomful of Athenian philosophers. Is she a freak
or a harbinger of what women can really be? Pythias must suffer
that argument, but she is also (mostly) secure in her father''s
regard.
But then Alexander dies a thousand miles from Athens, and sentiment
turns against anyone associated with him, most especially his
famous Macedonian-born teacher. Aristotle and his family are forced
to flee to Chalcis, a garrison town. Ailing, mourning and broken in
spirit, Aristotle soon dies. And his orphaned daughter, only 16,
finds out that the world is a place of superstition, not logic, and
that a girl can be played upon by gods and goddesses, as much as by
grown men and women. To safely journey to a place in which she can
be everything she truly is, Aristotle''s daughter will need every
ounce of wit she possesses, but also grace and the capacity to
love.