The Song of Achilles

What Readers Say

The phrase that follows this book around Reddit like a shadow is "emotionally destroyed me" — and they mean it as a compliment. People describe crying at random moments for a week after finishing it, waking up with swollen eyes, needing to lie on the floor afterward. What's striking is that these aren't readers who were blindsided. They knew exactly how the Iliad ends going in, and they read it anyway, hoping. That's what Miller's prose does: it makes you feel the tragedy building page by page, "in the most beautiful way," as one reader put it, and you can't stop.

The other consistent note is surprise. A lot of readers held off because Greek mythology didn't seem like their thing — then found themselves completely wrong. The writing gets credit for that. Multiple people describe it as lyrical without being difficult, literary without being slow. One reader said it made them feel smarter; another said Miller "could write a dishwasher manual" and they'd read it. The one dissenting voice I found on Reddit was honest about it: loved great prose, just wasn't interested in mythology — so that's a real data point, not a flaw in the book.

Who It's For

If you loved Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe, this is the book Reddit points to first. Same queer love story, same slow-build emotional devastation, same beautiful prose. If you've already read Circe (which many people discover first), readers are split — some say Song of Achilles hit harder because they read it first and it "rooted itself deep in my soul"; others say Circe topped it. Either order works. It's also the book people recommend when someone asks for literary fiction that doesn't feel like homework — it appears alongside The Secret History, Station Eleven, and Everything I Never Told You in "best of the year" lists.

It gets recommended for men skeptical of romance, for people who want something immersive and cinematic, and for anyone who asked Reddit to "rip my heart out." The queer love story is front and center — readers are enthusiastic about that, not apologetic.

Reading Context

This is a standalone novel, not a series, though Circe is frequently read as a companion — it shares the same mythological world and Miller's voice, and features Achilles as a minor character. The two books are in constant conversation on Reddit: people finish one and immediately reach for the other. Readers who want more in the genre tend to get pointed toward Ariadne by Jennifer Saint, The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood, The Silence of the Girls by Pat Barker, and Clytemnestra by Costanza Casati.

The audiobook for Circe gets specific praise; I haven't seen the same level of enthusiasm for the Song of Achilles audio, so your mileage may vary there. At 370 pages it reads fast — the prose pulls you through — and several people describe finishing it in two days or in a single sitting, which matches my read of the Reddit mood around it.