Author Laura Geringer and illustrator Leonid Gore join forces in this picture-book presentation of the Greek myth of Persephone. Kidnapped by her uncle Hades and taken to his palace in the underworld, Persephone resists all of her captor's efforts to reconcile her to her new life, and refuses all food. Her mother Demeter, in the meantime, searches the world over for her, so consumed by grief that she eventually causes all growing things to wither and die. When matters reach a crisis point, Zeus intervenes and arranges to have Persephone returned to her mother. All is not so simple however, as the captive Persphone, tempted by their beauty and fragrance, had eaten three pomegranate seeds, tying her to Hades' kingdom. Henceforth she would have to spend three months a year with him, and nine with her mother...

The story of Persephone - her kidnapping by Hades, her mother's consequent grief, the eventual arrangement whereby she divides her time between the upper and underworld - can be read as a pouquoi tale, one which explains the existence of the changing seasons. Given the sexual connotations it often has, and its theme of the kidnapped bride, it can also be read as a tale about the separation of young women from their natal families (at least in ancient Greek and other Mediterranean cultures), when they are married. Laura Geringer's retelling is taken from that of Nathaniel Hawthorne, in his 1853 Tanglewood Tales: A Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys, and is clearly meant to focus on the former interpretation. There are no sexual undertones here, and it is clear that Hades looks upon Persephone as a child, someone to brighten his dark days with her innocent play, rather than as someone who can offer the companionship and sexual relations that a wife would. I suspect that this was done, both by Hawthorne and Geringer, because this retelling is intended for children. Although the narrative here is engaging enough, I'm not sure that this approach to the myth really works, as the story loses some of its darker and more threatening undertones as a result. I also wasn't sure why it was necessary to include the episode with the lizard boy - a young boy cursed by Demeter, who exacts his revenge later on by convincing Persephone to eat the pomegranate seeds. This seems to shift the focus from the threat posed by Hades, who is described as playing childlike games with Persephone, to the harm done by Demeter. Finally, I was dismayed to see that Cerberus, the three-headed guard-dog of the underworld is, for some unknown reason, continually referred to as 'Cerebus' in the text here. Surely an editor should have caught that?

In the end, I did not find this to be an entirely successful retelling of the myth of Persephone. It's a delicate balance, trying to present stories with adult content for younger children, and I understand the desire to leave out the more disturbing elements. That said, it usually produces a narrative that lacks the power and appeal of the original, and that is certainly the case here. This is clearly a retelling intended for younger children, and yet it is incredibly text-heavy, with many two-page spreads containing nothing but text, and others pairing a page of text with a full-page illustration. The artwork itself, done by Leonid Gore, is lovely, but there isn't enough of it. I'd recommend Penelope Proddow's Demeter and Persephone: Homeric Hymn Number Two over this telling, if one wants a picture-book version of the story. ( )

Short sweet little myth about an uncle who kidnaps his niece because he is lonely. The mom searches, never giving up.

Overall, the story is well told, but there is the occasional odd word choice--describing Sisyphus as a "funny" man, for example. (Funny? That's hardly the word that comes to my mind when I think of a man doomed to rolling a rock up a hill over and over for all of eternity.) As well, I was less than pleased with the misty, indistinct paintings. While a dark cast to the illustrations would have been appropriate, there is insufficient detail here to create a sense of the dark opulence of Hades' kingdom. Geringer seems uncomfortable with the notion of "Uncle" Hades stealing his niece with intentions to wed her, so some of the power of the original myth is diluted. I was also puzzled about why the author chose the spelling "Cerebus" (rather than Cerberus) and referred to Apollo as Phoebus, rather than by his more common name. ( )