Mrs Belander: Francis's landlady. She feels sympathy towards Francis, as he is a veteran and is the person who inadvertently reveals that Larry LaSalle has returned to Frenchtown. Francis is plagued by the fact that he couldn’t stop his then-girlfriend, Nicole Renard from getting raped by Larry LaSalle. Stephen Fry is such a great narrator, and apparently a pretty great author as well. The voice with the perfect accent and tone and inflections, the wit, the easily accessible conversational style and the excellent ability to common-sense those weird Ancient Greek heroes and gods into normal regular odd people — all that worked perfectly.

Alice is an adventurer and explorer that reminds us all what it’s like to have such an imagination. This is another one of those books which my son brought home from school, apparently it is part of his GCSE English curriculum. I wasn't really looking forward to it and I was thinking it was just going to be a war thiller. Just like 'Of Mice and Men', I thought that 'Heroes' was very clever, and it became more so to me the more times I read it. It was less the actual content, but the structure that made it so. There was the story of Francis's childhood, and his escapades with Larry and Nicole, his experiences in the war, and finally, his post-war life, hiding from the world and waiting for his enemy to come home. After learning about the exploits of the Primordial Beings and Olympian Gods in Mythos, we now follow their mortal offspring, the Great Greek Heroes. The great and wise Gandalf is a powerful wizard who led the final War of the Ring and is a great hero throughout the series.

Who dared break into your chamber? Tell me his name and I shall have him gelded, tortured, and strangled with his own intestines.” Most notably, Perseus, Herakles (Hercules), Orpheus, Theseus, Jason, Atalanta, Oedipus and a few others (more minor ones) in between. Throughout the past few years, I have grown as a person- and so has my taste of books. I used to adore YA books, with cliché romance plots and heartwarming love stories to more sort of philosophical books, which most of the stories took part in 20th century america. Likewise when Francis throws himself onto a grenade, it appears to show a willingness to sacrifice his own life to save the lives of his comrades but later on he reveals that his real motivation was a way to committing suicide without disgracing his family. Thus his act of apparent selfless heroism hides a selfish action.

I enjoyed the following stories: Heracules/Hercules, Bellerophon, Atalanta and Orpheus. They either had a hint of romance or it felt a bit more like a fiction book where I could immerse a little more. In Heroes: The Greek Myths Reimagined, Stephen Fry’s retelling of the timeless tales of the “heroes", we learn about the origins, quests, triumphs and legacies of Perseus, Heracles, Bellerophon, Orpheus, Jason, Oedipus and Atalanta. The stories of Atalanta, the only female among the heroes and that of Bellephoron were completely new for me and I enjoyed them thoroughly. The Labors of Heracles and the story of Jason and the Argonauts were my personal favorites. I particularly enjoyed getting to know more about the mythical creatures the heroes go up against. Stephen Fry’s characteristic humor and wit render this an informative, entertaining and engaging read.

Heroes by Robert Cormier is a 1998 novel written by Robert Cormier. The novel is centred on the character Francis Cassavant, who has just returned to his childhood home of Frenchtown, Monument (in Massachusetts), from serving in the Second World War in France and has severe deformities as a result of an incident during the war. Katniss is a strong young woman who is truly a “hero” when she wins The Hunger Games. Her strength and endurance after all she’s been through makes her quite exceptional. Whilst Fry is a very funny person, he is also incredibly insightful. As well as informing the reader in an entertaining way about the stories of the Greek heroes that he talks about, he also provides another level to the reading experience. He adds his own subjective opinions on what is important in the story, what it signifies, and also how these could relate to our modern day culture and how we live our lives. This allowed further understanding regarding Ancient Greek culture, and introduced an aspect to the tale which is about why is is important to revisit mythological tales in the 21st century.

My main criticism of this work is that it doesn’t feel whole. It doesn’t feel like a consistent narrative. It’s the sort of book you dip in and out of, as you read about a character and move onto the next. Mythos didn’t have this affect, it felt like it built on itself as it established some of the core systems behind the gods. These characters aren’t connected. They’re not supposed to be, but at times it felt like I was reading different sections from different books. The idea of Heroes and heroics only connects them loosely, as some are more heroic than others and some are even villainous, at least in part. Ich bin froh, dass der Autor nicht nur die bekannten Helden wieder aufgreift oder die altbekannten Heldentaten nacherzählt. Sehr amüsant und lustig werden die Heldentaten aufgezählt, ganz nüchtern ohne die Taten zu urteilen. Als ich das Buch angefangen habe, hatte ich Kommentare vom Autor erwartet, aber wenn man sein Nachwort liest, versteht man, warum er die Geschichten so erzählt hat. Insbesondere haben mir die Geschichten um Herakles und Atalante gefallen. When I was a child my favourite movie was Clash of the Titans - the 1981 film with Maggie Smith as Athena and Laurence Olivier as Zeus. Medusa was, and is, the scariest monster I have ever seen on TV and I regularly had to leave my light on when I went to sleep because I thought she was going to come and slither up the stairs and turn me to stone.Francis gradually slowly his past and his motivation for murder leaving the reader wondering if Francis is punishing Larry for his misdeeds or himself for his own inaction?