Sirena has listened to the stories of the gods: If she is to become immortal, she must be loved by a human man. But when she and her sisters sing their siren songs to the Greek sailors on their way to the Trojan War, the men crash their ships upon the rocks and drown. There is one survivor of the carnage Philoctetes, friend to Hercules and a hero himself. Sirena defies Hera by tending his wounds and bringing him food, and soon the two are keep in love. But does Philoctetes love Sirena's song, or her soul? And will the pull of honor prove stronger than the bond of love? Distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.

Like its mermaid heroine, this uneven novel is something of a hybrid: a romantic fantasy imposed atop a classical legend. A lengthy, even laborious set-up invents a genealogy for mermaids within Greek mythology (at least, this appears invented; there are no source notes). Offered immortality if they can win a man's love, Sirena's mermaid sisters use their silvery voices to lure sailors to them even though it will cause the sailors certain death. Sirena, however, exiles herself from this grim mating game and winds up on the island of Lemnos. There she meets the Greek warrior Philoctetes (the subject of a famous play by Sophocles). True to the legend, this Philoctetes has been abandoned by his crew mates because of a snake bite‘but instead of spending the next 10 years letting his wounds fester, per the Sophoclean model, this hero falls in love with an equally adoring Sirena. She becomes immortal, a gift that she does not want in light of her lover's inability to share it, and then she must yield him up when fate calls upon him to reenter the Trojan War. Napoli (Song of the Magdalene) is at her best when she compares Philoctetes's and Sirena's points of view about subjects like honor, but the bulky apparatus she constructs overwhelms the writing. The atmosphere is surprisingly arid, and the language slides dangerously between the stuff of high drama and pulp romance. There are better romantic YA novels built on Greek myth (e.g., Doris Orgel's The Princess and the God); for mermaid lore see Mary Pope Osborne's Mermaid Stories from Around the World. Ages 12-up. (Oct.) From: Reed Elsevier Inc. Copyright Reed Business Information

Gr 8 Up-Once again Napoli takes an old story and offers new perspectives for thoughtful readers to ponder. While young people may be unfamiliar with the story of the Sirens, lack of knowledge will not prevent them from enjoying this absorbing novel. Here, the creatures are depicted as pubescent mermaids who crave the immortality that only a man's love will give them. Sirena, one of a school of 10 such sea creatures, turns her back on her sisters and chooses to live in silent isolation rather than follow her prescribed role as an enchantress. While there are plenty of references to mythic characters and events, the heart of this novel is Sirena's all-too-human story of love found and lost when the injured Philoctetes is abandoned on an island by his shipmates. As in her earlier titles, the author both expands upon the original story, offering background information and details of newly imagined events, and tells the tale from a different, decidedly personal perspective. The prose moves fluidly and the chapters flow smoothly into one another, emphasizing and complementing the watery setting and the swift passage of time. Secondary characters are clearly drawn yet retain a sense of distance that enhances the story's mythic aspects. Napoli uses Sirena's love of storytelling to insert details and information that may be unfamiliar to modern readers. This love of story will quickly and easily transfer to YAs who will fall under the spell of her siren song and eagerly await her next foray into reimagined fantasy. It is also likely that the book will encourage readers to seek out the myths and literature that inspired it.-Lisa Dennis, The Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, PA From: Reed Elsevier Inc. Copyright Reed Business Information

Gr. 7^-12. Napoli has forged a brilliant writing career out of making readers see compellingly different interpretations of mythic figures, such as Rapunzel in Zel (1996) and Mary Magdalen in Song of the Magdalene (1996). Here she re-imagines and fuses several parts of the story of Troy. The mermaid Sirena knows that if the song she sings with her sisters lures a mortal man to mate with her she will live forever. The death of shipwrecked sailors and of one of her sister mermaids chills her, however, and she swims away alone to the island of Lemnos. There she rescues Philoctetes, who has been wounded by Hera's serpent and abandoned by his crewmates. They fall in love and build a rich life together, one made from sharing their separate knowledge, harmonizing their differences, and telling each other stories. But Sirena knows her union with Philoctetes has made her immortal, and that he will die. Each time Philoctetes tells her a tale of Heracles, whose poisoned arrows he holds, or of the centaur or the minotaur, Sirena sees it in a different light--she can always see the heroes as villains, and vice versa. When a ship finally comes for her lover (Philoctetes is destined to kill Paris), she begs the goddess Dora to make her mortal again or to make Philoctetes immortal. When Dora refuses, Sirena must find a way to placate honor, love, desire, and separation. This is a troublesome story that takes some time to get off the ground; but even flawed, Napoli's tale is rich in insight, fine language, and a look at truth told aslant. It is full of the sweetness of longing, romance, and the space and togetherness needed for any close relationship. --GraceAnne A. DeCandido From: Syndetics Solutions, Inc. Distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.

Donna Jo Napoli was born in 1948. She has earned three degrees from Harvard University: a B.A. in Mathematics, an M.A. in Italian Literature, and a Ph.D. in General and Romance Linguistics. She has taught on the university level since 1970, is widely published in scholarly journals and has received numerous grants and fellowships in the area of linguistics.

She teaches linguistics and was chair of the linguistics program at Swarthmore College, where she also teaches courses in writing fiction for children. In addition to writing for children, she is a published poet and coeditor of four poetry volumes. Napoli was introduced to Dutton by Lloyd Alexander. Dutton promptly published her first middle grade novel, Soccer Shock, in 1991 to critical and popular acclaim.

In 1993, Napoli's versatility became evident with the publication of The Prince of the Pond which won the New Jersey Reading Association's M. Jerry Weiss Book Award in 1997. Napoli has also won a Bulletin Blue Ribbon, School Library Journal Best Book of the Year, and a Publishers Weekly Choice of the Years Best books for her novel Zel. Napoli's Stones in Water won the Golden Kite Award in 1997.

(Bowker Author Biography) Distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.