An ambitious debut ... Stiletto-sharp ... What ensues in Ecstasy isn’t exactly a surprise, even if you haven’t read Euripides, though it’s still shocking. Nearly 2,500 years after The Bacchae, Pochoda proves that the old gods never die. They just move on to another party.
Quick, bloody fun, even as it turns on the hardships of middle age ... Ms. Pochoda knows her myths; it’s a pity she doesn’t give most of the characters the complexity that Greek tragedies require. But if you can’t make it to Mykonos or Corfu for parties this summer, this book may be the next best thing.
Full of relentlessly unsettling moments that will shake even the staunchest reader. This fever dream of a story is short and can be consumed easily in one sitting ... A quick and powerful novel that shows off Ivy Pochoda’s gifts as a writer who knows how to get under readers’ skin.
Tght, ferocious prose ... Pochoda’s intoxicating feminist retelling of The Bacchae is full of dreamlike prose that flows effortlessly. A great pick for fans of CJ Leede and Cassandra Khaw that begs to be finished in one sitting.
Lyrical and dreamlike ... Perfect for fans of Greek retellings and novels that explore feminine rage and empowerment, like Rachel Yoder’s Nightbitch(2021) or Kirsten Miller’s The Change (2022).
Defiantly feminist ... Pochoda’s sun-drenched, blood-soaked literary fever dream pits hubris against hedonism, likens religion to rave culture, and explores the transformative power of female rage. Incandescent prose, present-tense narration, and frequent perspective shifts impart urgency, rendering the characters’ passions palpable. It’s a gleefully transgressive tour de force.
Clunky ... Also unpleasant are the constant expressions of revulsion for the aging female body ... Pochoda’s reliance on sentence fragments and single-sentence or single-word paragraphs add to an overall hasty feel, and probably not the kind of horror the author intended ... A hot mess.
