On the day of his daughter's wedding, Agamemnon orders her sacrifice. His daughter is led to her death, and Agamemnon leads his army into battle, where he is rewarded with glorious victory. Three years later, he returns home and his murderous action has set the entire family - mother, brother, sister - on a path of intimate violence, as they enter a world of hushed commands and soundless journeys through the palace's dungeons and bedchambers. As his wife seeks his death, his daughter, Electra, is the silent observer to the family's game of innocence while his son, Orestes, is sent into bewildering, frightening exile where survival is far from certain. Out of their desolating loss, Electra and Orestes must find a way to right these wrongs of the past even if it means committing themselves to a terrible, barbarous act. House of Names is a story of intense longing and shocking betrayal. It is a work of great beauty, and daring, from one of our finest living writers.
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This was hard to rate or to review because I loved the Clytemnestra part, which started the book. When it began, I honestly thought I was looking at a five-star read here. It was touching and intense and emotional and it's always been a story I've been fascinated with.
Orestes and Electra, when they had their own parts, just felt less real. They didn't bring that same level of emotion, and I honestly got bored during a portion of Orestes' story.
Maybe I should have known when the synopsis discussed Clytemnestra as one of history's greatest villains that this wasn't going to quite be for me, but that beginning left me with so much hope.
Overall it wasn't bad, I just wanted to rate each part of it individually, almost, so I'm kind of averaging in my overall score. It felt like it ended on a weaker portion, and that's hard to forgive when it began with such promise.