Achilles’s Wife for Preorder Amid a Riches of Myth Retellings

The author life can be brutal at times, but there’s one aspect that I will always appreciate. Authors can be friends not competitors. Books about similar subjects and genres help each other reach new readers rather than compete against each other. When a really good book comes out, readers who love it will soon ask, “What else can I read like this one?” Authors enjoy sharing their communities of readers. I have joked for years that, fortunately, books are not like refrigerators. One is never enough.

Achilles’s Wife Surrounded

So in the week when I’ve put Achilles’s Wife up for preorder–here for Amazon (affiliate) or here for Bookshop.org–I’m thrilled to discover how many of my favorite authors of Greek myth retellings are coming out with books in 2026. Who else will be joining my towering to-be-read list? I’ll give you a quick taste, but the full list will have to wait for more posts over the coming months because there are SO many.

Natalie Haynes with Medea

Natalie Haynes has taken on Medea in No Friend to This House. I love the complexities of Medea (who appears in Achilles’s Wife although she’s not a traditional part of the myth of Deidamia and Achilles). Natalie Haynes writes highly compelling feminist retellings and goes places I would never imagine with them. Out in the US March 10.

Jennifer Saint with Aphrodite & Ares

Jennifer Saint, also one of my favorite writers of myth reinterpretations, has a tale of Aphrodite and Ares called This Immortal Heart. Here’s a snippet from her book’s description, “When fate brings her face to face with Ares, she bristles at this surly, hot-tempered warrior who’s seemingly her opposite: disliked by everyone and devoted to stirring up conflict. Yet these gods are no more immune to the dizzying highs and lows of love and loss than anyone else, and soon, they are irresistibly drawn to one another.” A tale of opposites attracting, but without a simple romantic solution. Out June 9.

Christopoulou with Klytemnestra and Lady Macbeth

The last title I’ll share today is Vile Lady Villains by Danai Christopoulou. Her book description opens: “With the consequences of her murderous actions closing in, Lady Macbeth turns to the three witches for help, who give her a potion that transports her to an unknown realm. Desperately lost, she opens a door and comes face to face with a beautiful woman drenched in blood.” This mythic mashup has Klytemnestra and Lady Macbeth joining forces. Uh-oh. I haven’t read Christopoulou before but I’m looking forward to this one. She gets points in my reckoning for creative plucking of main characters across millennia. The description sounds a bit meta, which I enjoy. Out May 12.

Starkston with Deidamia and Achilles

So Achilles’s Wife will have good company in the attention of readers this year, and for that, I am very grateful. Here’s the book page to learn more about Achilles’s Wife.

Let the binge reading begin.