4.25/5 stars

The Palace of Eros is a sapphic (F x enby) retelling of the Greek myth of Eros and Psyche. It’s a love story in which Psyche is ordered never to look upon Eros… until the fateful day when she does.
I loved this, as I love most mythology retellings, and the fact that it was queer added some major points. It was such a good romance that also had so much amazing commentary on gender fluidity and patriarchal/misogynistic norms.
I adored Eros’s character. Psyche too, but Eros really stole the show. I loved the intersex/nonbinary representation and the way she was so fiercely rebellious against the binary that she was forced into.
My main complaint with this book is that, while the writing was gorgeous, there were times where it was a little too flowery. I noticed multiple times where there would be a giant stream-of-consciousness paragraph in the middle of a dialogue, which was super jarring and made it hard to follow the conversations.
I found the smut scenes to be some of the best I’ve ever read. This is a book about Eros (goddess of desire) and the author really pulled through with some of the most poetic erotica I’ve ever seen.
I loved the way that this was a sweet and spicy romance between two feminine characters, while the rest of the Greek pantheon is absolute garbage. This is one of the worst (moral) portrayals I’ve ever seen of Zeus and Hera, and I wanted to give Eros a hug.

CW: as is often the case with Greek mythology, there’s some triggering content in this book — I’m listing the major ones that I noticed, but check warnings before you go in
Sexual assault/harassment; physical/domestic abuse; sexual content (some consensual and some not); misogyny; transphobia; lesbophobia

Will be one of my favorites of the year. This book has something for everyone. It is a greek retelling, but also a romance and deeply horny lit fic. De Robertis remains one of my favorite authors.

The Palace of Eros is a new take on the Greek myth of Psyche and Eros in such a fresh and queer-centered way that I enjoyed. This was the easiest and most captivating retelling I’ve ever read, and I could not put it down. This book explores sapphic love in such a beautiful and gentle way and gets into some fascinating commentary on marriage and the patriarchy in general. It also goes into gender identity and expression to round it all off!

This book is a little jarring at times if you haven’t been in the trenches of AO3 or expect certain things out of the myth. I love a polarizing book and I think this one is going to have lovers and haters but I’m so grateful I got the chance to read it!

This novel gives us the voice of a woman who has yet to have a voice. A strong female lead who is able to be strong within herself and use that strength to overcome. The only issue with this is that the novel reiterates the female agenda without letting the story speak that agenda itself.

This was the first for me to read the story of Psyche and Eros, and I loved it. It was so emotion-packed that I couldn't put it down, I even shed a few tears, the emotions could be felt through the pages and I felt the writing gave justice to it.

after finishing this I did a deep dive and read the original story, and I can say I greatly preferred this, I love how true it was and I'll be picking up a physical copy when it comes out.

If I could have given this book ten stars I would have because Caro De Robertis has created a literary masterpiece - a feast for my eyes and heart to devour. Every word of this delightful story felt like a love letter to the mythical, ancient and timeless love between Eros and Psyche. This story should come with a warning letter, “Do not open this book until you clear your schedule because you won’t be able to put it down until you get to the last page.” I wasn’t warned about how captivating this story would be and I ended up pulling off the longest reading marathon of my life and I have no regrets whatsoever. This author did a fantastic job of creating realistic characters with personalities that just leaped off the pages and I felt as though I was witnessing the interactions between Psyche and her sisters firsthand and I also had a front row seat to Eros and Psyche’s conflicting thoughts and emotions. By the way, I’m so in love with this gorgeous book cover!

A huge thank you to the author, the publisher and Netgalley for allowing me to read an advanced review copy of this magnificent story.

The Palace of Eros is a beautiful retelling of the myth of Eros and Psyche. De Robertis’ writing is gorgeous and I was invested from the first page. This is something I very rarely say, but I actually wish the book was longer. I feel like the reader needs more time diving deeply into this stunning love story.

I love greek mythology and always give the retellings a shot, but somehow they always fall a bit flat for me. The writing was beautiful, if a bit dense at times, and the characters were interesting, but it still felt like it dragged a bit at times. I loved the queer twist on the retelling and hope that more greek mythology retellings will follow the same path.

I really loved this queer retelling of the Psyche and Eros myth! Right now, I feel like we're seeing a lot of reimagings of Greek mythology and The Palace of Eros managed to stand out for me with its strong characterizations, storytelling, and the author's clear voice. There were some moments were the writing style felt a bit heavy handed for me but overall, the book is a great read and any reader who had a Greek mythology phase as a kid will apreciate the consideration given to the source material 🧡💜

Rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟

Thank you to Caro De Robertis, Atria Books, and Netgalley for providing me with an eARC of this book in exchange for an honest review 🤗

I loved the story, the world building and meeting the different characters. I felt completely immersed in the story and couldn't stop reading it.

I feel like I keep searching through so many anticipated releases, waiting for something that will break the reading slump. Unfortunately, this one just wasn't the one to do it. I just felt bored.

Thank you to Netgalley and the Publisher for the eARC of The Palace of Eros by Cara De Robertis. I have always been a fan of Greek Mythology and Psyche and Eros’ story is one of my favorites. I love that De Robertis chose to give this a sapphic spin, it’s gripping, it’s inspiring, it’s beautiful. Undoubtedly this story will easily be some readers’ favorite retelling. For me, I feel like it needed some extra attention to detail in the writing style, pacing, and dialogue. At some points I was on the edge of my seat completely enthralled by the beautiful story that was unfolding, however, in other points I was wrenched from the scene by words that didn’t flow, plot that seemed to drag, and character inconsistencies. This may not have been my top pick of the year but it was still a wonderful read and I’d love to recommend it to others.

This is the sapphic Greek mythology retelling that I have been waiting for. Steamy, beautiful, longing - it's what I have wanted for sapphics since reading Song of Achilles. It was well worth the wait, and I hope this finds its audience so that we get more like it.

The sex scenes are beautifully written, lyrical and dreamlike. I loved seeing Psyche grow into herself, even as I wanted more for her. The gender "swap" of Eros was much more complicated and nuanced than I expected, in a beautiful way. Everything about this book was beautiful, and I loved sinking into it.

Psyche never wanted the attention, she never wanted Aphrodite to forsake her people, she never wanted to be leered at by men while sitting in a sheep pen.

In this Psyche and Eros retelling, Eros was born a goddess. She can transform between the male and female body, but prefers somewhere in between. To Zeus (who is of course a dick and loves his own dick), this is unacceptable. But, she finds love and acceptance in her mother's hated Psyche. Eros saved her, set her free, but kept her in a guilded cage. Only visiting her at night under the shroud of darkness, where they are hidden from the other gods. Of course, this cannot last. Doubts form. Lovers are betrayed.

De Robertis' writing was gut wrenching. The book alternates between first person Psyche POV and third person Eros POV. In Psyche's inner monologue (which was the majority of the book) I could feel everything from her wonder to her pain. The Palace of Eros belongs next to Song of Achilles both on the shelf and in the hearts of readers.

One issue I had with this book was the extremely long Psyche chapters and paragraphs that took up an entire page. I also expected a little more in terms of the ending. Modern (especially American) readers love happily ever afters with stories wrapped up in a neat bow. But that is not necessarily what I want with a Greek mythology retelling. The ending was rushed and I was confused about the decisions the gods were making based on everything else I know about them from Greek mythology. (There were also a few spelling and punctuation errors that will hopefully be fixed by publication.)

I plan to buy a copy of this book when it comes out. De Robertis tore out my heart in the best possible way.

Tiktok and Instagram reviews will be released closer to the book release date and the link will be updated.

thank you to netgalley for the eARC.

there’s so much to say about this amazing book and so little that i’m able to reveal.

i adored this book. it’s one of my favorite reads of the year. i think it will be a book that i think about often. even when i wasn’t actively reading it, i was thinking about different quotes.

starting it, i was a bit worried since i was on the fence during the first chapter. i thought it would follow that chapter’s tone for several chapters, but i was very wrong. by chapter three, i did not want to put it down. i fell in love with psyche and eros. i just knew it was going to be five stars very early on, like chapter five early on.

this book was written beautifully. the main characters were written beautifully. the relationship between them was written beautifully. i can’t think of a single thing that i didn’t enjoy from this book, other than the tragic stories obviously.

the writing style was very poetic which i loved. i’m a big fan of how poetic such simple things can be written and this book does just that.

i wish i could read this book for the first time again. i can’t gush over this book and their characters enough. i’m definitely planning to read more from this author.

Greek mythology retellings are a dime a dozen these days, and in order for an author to set their own retelling apart, they have to boldly venture into territory that has previously gone unexplored. Caro De Robertis does this in their masterful retelling of Psyche and Eros, which is gradually becoming a more popular myth. De Robertis manages to simultaneously honor the timelessness of the myth while also making it feel fresh and modern. In order to more fully explain my likes and critiques, I will be breaking my review up into sections.

The first thing that stood out to me about this novel was Psyche's relationship with her mother and sisters. I appreciated the complexities of their interactions and how the author showed the reader how they loved one another, but didn't exactly like one another. That's a hard dymanic to pull off, and De Robertis does it masterfully. I do wish there had been more of a relationship between Psyche and her father, but at the same time, I also understood why there wasn't.

This book was a firmly feminist retelling, but it managed to avoid some of the pitfalls that other feminist retellings of popular myths often fall into. Unlike other myth retellings I've been reading lately, The Palace of Eros steers clear of the sisterhood narrative--the idea that all women have the same experience and are therefore united in the face of misogyny. Rather than show all women as a united front, this book takes a more realistic and nuanced approach to female empowerment and shows how women can hurt each other just like men do, and how some women don't hesitate to use their power to harm others the same as men. In other words, this book showcases women's wrongs the same way it fights for women's rights, and the narrative was better for it.

The characterization of the two leads was also incredibly well done. Psyche and Eros were allowed to be complicated characters who sometimes made bad choices in their efforts to do the right thing, and their characters and their dynamic pulled me into the story. Their relationship developed organically, and I could feel Psyche's wonder as she learned to explore her wants and needs for the first time in her life. Psyche and Eros supported each other and accepted each other for all that they were, which will be affirming for readers who have faced some of the same challenges as Psyche and Eros.

However, my favorite thing about this novel was the inclusion of a non-binary sapphic Eros. As I mentioned earlier in my review, authors have to be bold and find some way to set themselves apart from the crowd in order to promote their myth retellings, and the enclusion of an enby, sexually fluid Eros is how this book gives itself that unique flair. Eros's storyline drew me into the story because it was an interpretation of the character I'd never seen before, and it will be very meaningful to a lot of readers who may still be figuring out who they are.

That being said, this book stumbled in places. I mentioned above how this book managed to steer clear of a lot of the pitfalls most modern feminist retellings often fell into. That is still true, but it didn't steer clear of all of them. This book frequently got bogged down by the 'all men are bad' message, and very little was done to counteract this view. Most of the men who were featured in the novel only existed to showcase sexism and violence against women, which led to a take on misogyny that wasn't as nuanced as it could have been. Ancient Greece was a very patriarchical society, but it could have been shown in a different way.

The second critique I had was about the writing style. At first, I loved the stream-of-conciousness, poetic narrative, but I quickly grew tired of it. Paragraphs often took up entire pages, and there were run-on sentences galore. As a result, I often became lost and had a hard time following the story. Granted, that flowery style was necessary in some places in the book, but it wasn't needed to tell the entire story--and because it was used that way, it didn't have as much impact as it otherwise could have. The majority of the story also took place in one location, and as a result, the narrative stalled out in places. If there had been more chapters in between to break up the time Psyche spent in Eros' palace, some of that staleness could have been remedied.

Overall, The Palace of Eros by Caro De Robertis is a Psyche and Eros retelling that is not to be missed. From the inclusion of a non-binary, fluid Eros and a sapphic Pysche to the way the book avoids reductive tropes such as the sisterhood narrative, the Palace of Eros proves its ingenuity and makes itself stand out in the vast sea of Greek mythological retellings.

Unfortunately, this one was a DNF for me. At 21% in, I wasn't interested because the descriptions went on too long. The characters sounded too similar, and I kept forgetting whose head we were in.

This book was my second Greek mythology retelling story I've read, the first being A Song of Achilles. A lot of exploration into the idea of freedom and what freedom is for different characters. I liked how this book addressed being a female in this time period. Eros being a non-binary deity and the language to describe Eros (she/her pronouns) was a little confusing at times. There were moments in Eros' perspective where I felt like there was some internal perspective of how one feels when they don't really identify as male or female. Overall a good book and one that I'll be adding to my shelf to admire.

Unfortunately, not much of this book worked for me. I was hooked by the prospect of a queer Psyche and Eros retelling, but most of this fell flat in my opinion.

The best part of this book was by far the prose, as the writing was some of the best I think I've read. It was lyrical, and flowery, and beautiful, and unfortunately one of the only redeeming qualities of this book. One of my biggest issues with this was this was the pacing. There was a huge chunk of this book where Psyche and Eros did not communicate anything besides desire to each other, and this was resolved by them repeatedly having sex, which made me believe they were only compatible sexually. And then the end felt very rushed and a little bit random. I also just didn't really like Eros that much. I think she kind of had a god complex (ha, ha) and took Psyche for granted. My favorite scenes in the whole book were actually when she got called out on this lol. I also really liked how this book depicted Aphrodite and Persephone though.

Overall, I did not enjoy the majority of this book. I think if the couple lived in modern times, they would break up, and their relationship hinging almost entirely on the physical aspects did not work for me. I would not recommend this to most readers, but if you like queer retellings that explore desire and freedom and are little plot, mainly vibes, you might like this!

A thought-provoking read, but I didn't really connect with the main characters and a lot of the prose felt long-winded and unnecessary. It was good overall though, and I loved the cover.