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Circe
The novel’s protagonist. Circe is a Titan divinity, and her character is loosely based off that of her namesake in Homer’s The Odyssey. The novel is told entirely from her point of view. Her name means hawk, and this is a reference to her golden eyes and her incredibly rough voice—a voice that the god Hermes notes is the voice of a mortal. Her family considers her a lesser goddess, and she wants to please the gods and other divine beings in her father’s palace. She is exiled to the island Aiaia for using witchcraft to transform a mortal she loves into a god and her rival into a horrible monster. On the island, she nurtures her powers. She transforms mortals into pigs, kills men, takes lovers, and gives birth to a son as she battles a growing awareness of her own isolation and loneliness. She looks for love, both from others and within herself, until she finally realizes that gods cannot truly ever find happiness because they never change.
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Odysseus
The prince of Ithaca and the hero of the Trojan War, based on the character from Homer’s The Odyssey. Odysseus visits Circe on her island, and the two fall in love, but he longs for his wife Penelope and son Telemachus. Odysseus and his crew stay a year with Circe, and she admires his cleverness and bluntness and enjoys his stories about his experiences in the world. After he returns home to Ithaca, he becomes violent and paranoid, and he is killed when he tries to attack Telegonus, whom he does not know is the son he shares with Circe.
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Telemachus
The prince of Ithaca and Odysseus’s son. Telemachus flees to Circe’s island with his mother Penelope after Telegonus accidentally kills their father. He feels guilty not only for helping his father murder the suitors who took over his home, but also for killing innocent serving-women. This burden of guilt echoes Circe’s guilt over creating the monster Scylla. The two fall in love and want to spend their lives together.
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Telegonus
The adventurous son of Circe and Odysseus. Crying and fretful, he is an incredibly difficult baby. Despite this, Telegonus enables Circe to feel a lasting and enduring love. Circe always puts his needs and well-being above her own, even when it means letting him leave Aiaia.
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Daedalus
A master inventor and craftsman. Daedalus is Pasiphaë’s mortal prisoner. He becomes Circe’s lover while she is in her sister’s home. When Circe leaves, he sends a loom with her which she uses back in Aiaia. Circe remembers Daedalus as one of the best men she knows, and she measures the character of other men against his throughout the novel.
Penelope
The wife of Odysseus and mother of Telemachus. Penelope comes to Aiaia with Telemachus after Odysseus’s death. Despite mutual distrust at the outset of their relationship, Penelope and Circe become good friends, and she ultimately takes over residence on Aiaia when Circe and Telemachus leave together.
Scylla
A beautiful nymph whom Circe transforms into a monster out of jealousy. Circe’s guilt over using pharmaka to turn Scylla into a murderous monster is one of the main motivating forces for Circe's development throughout the novel. Circe eventually turns Scylla into stone.
Glaucos
A mortal fisherman whom Circe turns into a god. Glaucos is the first person Circe gets to know outside her family, and she thinks she loves him. Once he becomes a god, he abandons her, demonstrating how callous and selfish the gods are.
Hermes
The messenger god and one of Circe’s lovers. Hermes brings Circe news and gossip from the outside world, including information about the havoc Scylla is wreaking. He also helps Telegonus build a ship to leave Aiaia.
Athena
The Olympian goddess of wisdom and patron of Odysseus. Athena knows that Telegonus will be the instrument of Odysseus’s death, and she seeks to kill him when he’s still an infant. While Circe is initially infatuated with Athena, she eventually becomes Circe’s adversary.
Helios
The god of the sun and father of Circe. Circe is Helios’s least favorite child. He exiles her to avoid a battle with Zeus and fails to come to her aid when she’s raped.
Perse
A nymph daughter of Oceanus and mother of Circe. Perse is Helios’s wife, and she is vain and insecure in her position. She takes pride in the fact that her four children are pharmakis, but otherwise takes no real interest in them.
Aeëtes
A powerful practitioner of magic and Circe’s younger brother. Although Circe raises Aeëtes and they are close, Aeëtes becomes cynical and cruel after establishing a kingdom in Cochis. He is a powerful sorcerer who ultimately turns on Circe.
Prometheus
A Titan god who is punished for giving fire to humans. Circe watches Prometheus’s public torture and punishment, and she secretly brings him nectar and talks to him. He is evidence to Circe that not all gods are alike in cruelty.
Pasiphaë
Circe’s sister, wife to Minos, mother of the Minotaur. Pasiphaë is clever and cruel. After marrying Minos and moving to Crete, she uses witchcraft to manipulate others into doing her bidding.
Perses
Circe’s older brother. He is one of the family members who taunts and scorns Circe. He leaves their father’s palace to live in Persia and is reportedly a powerful witch.
Medea
Circe’s niece and daughter of Aeëtes. She is a powerful witch who visits Circe for ritual spiritual cleansing after betraying her father and killing her brother in order to escape.
Jason
The prince of Iolcos and husband of Medea. Jason takes the golden fleece from Aeëtes with Medea’s help before fleeing to Aiaia. He eventually abandons Medea as Circe warned her he would.
Minotaur
A horrible monster with the head of a bull and body of a man. He is the child of Pasiphaë and Minos. Circe enacts a spell to keep his ravenous bloodthirst confined to only one season each year, and Daedalus builds a maze to keep him trapped.
Minos
The king of Crete and husband of Pasiphaë. Minos is a demi-god, fathered by Zeus. He demands human sacrifices from Athens to feed Pasiphaë’s son, the Minotaur.
