Mestra by Madeline Miller Book Review

 Mestra 

By Madeline Miller 

Published Year: 2026

Page Count: 68 pages

Medium Used : Oneplus Nord Ce6, Moon Reader 

Genre: Mythology, Ancient Greece, Cannibalism, Horror, Suspense, Shape Shifter, 2026-read.

Rating : 4/5 😎 😎 😎 😎 

Only 60 odd pages. I wonder why this book isn't longer. The material for the story is solid and could have been extended. There is an eerie and ominous sense of impending doom in the pages drawing to the end of the story. The consequences/fate met by the king of Thessaly, the protagonist's father, are not novel - I just came across something similar in a short story by Stephen King, published in his anthology, Skeleton Crew. Someone resorting to cannibalism and that too an extreme version of it! I just felt that the loyalty and obedience Mestra had for her father was one way and purely from her side! I was just hoping that she would learn of it before it's too late. 

Mestra is raped by Poseidon and later gifted with shape shifting ability when she was to escape from a brute to whom her father had sold her in exchange for seven roast chickens. She turns into a sea faring, strong man and returns to her father who figures out that she can turn into any person/animal she has encountered in her life. So from then, the father, a former king of Thessaly, sells his daughter as a young woman, as a horse, as a milking cow so many times each day and earns plenty of coin and silver. (So she gets sold and then she escapes donning one of the many forms she can take.) All that wealth cannot buy him food enough to satiate his hunger or keep him warm even under summer heat. You see, he is a cursed man. I think it's his curse that he is perpetually hungry and cold. His daughter suggests that they make attempts to appease the god who cursed him but he turns a deaf ear. 

As I was reading it, I was holding my breath, waiting to see what harm is going to befall Mestra. What heinous act he has planned to commit upon her trusting self. He seemed totally and utterly self serving and greedy. He has used her in any number of disgusting ways and now she seems to be graduating. 😂🤣 From being sold to being eaten. More than buying regular food. He wants to eat her gifted ambrosia like flesh. Lol 😆  at this point i was thinking he cannot go any more lower. And he does. And she does what she has to. Its all like being driven by fate.

I liked how well the characters are defined. This shows we don't need pages and pages of story to really connect with the characters. Even though the fate of the king is horrid, it is only inevitable. When the daughter was taking care of him, he seemed carefree. He wanted to eat and that he did. He lost his kingdom and everything, didn't want to appease the punishing god but even at the end he showed his character's singular trait - stubbornness with greed.