The untold, retold, and often undertold interweaving stories of the women in and around the Trojan War. Tied together are Euripides' Hecuba, The Trojan Women, Helen, and Aeschylus' Orestia. Homer gets a beating at the hand of Calliope, angered by his call: "Sing, Muse." There are many compelling chapters and hers may be the least believable. Penelope gets plenty of airtime and her bits are only second to Andromache's in emotional heft. They are also the least true to source as she writes to Odysseus of all of his deeds and misadventures, sung by the bards. Where they hear of his encounters is far from clear and far from The Odyssey. Chapter 38 begins with her account of the bard's singing of Odysseus' detainment on Ogygia by Calypso and is, at first, irritating, but, at last, heart breaking. Haynes gives Penelope the voice we've never heard. She's portrayed as a thoughtful, sardonic, expressive character. Her increasingly acerbic letters to Odysseus give a fresh perspective into Odysseus' travails as less the work of chance as of Odysseus' cunning and glory-seeking.
The most heart wrenching chapters are those of Andromache's enslavement in Neoptolemus' house (again borrowing from Euripides, the feminist of the Greek poets and dramatists).