Snakehead (29 page)

Serifos, Naxos, Paros, Milos, Kriti
(Crete),
Keros
, and
Fira
(Santorini) are all real islands in the Aegean, in the Greek Mediterranean. All of them except Crete belong to the group of islands known as the Kyklades, or Turning Islands: in modern English, the Cyclades.

The Twelve Islands
, or in modern English the
Dodecanese
, is another real group of islands farther to the east.

Parga
is still a port on the northwest coast of the Greek mainland. Nearby you can visit the river
Styx
, and the Necromanteion, the Oracle of the Dead: an ancient place of pilgrimage known as the entrance to the underworld. The Styx was believed in ancient times to be—somehow—both a real, mysterious watercourse, and the river that the dead crossed to reach the afterlife.

The Garden of the Hesperides
, supposed to be found on the slopes of the Atlas Mountains, in what is now Morocco, is the lair of the hideous Gorgons in the story of Perseus. Mysteriously, in other tales it features as a kind of Garden of Eden, an original paradise.

Haifa
was probably sited where modern Jaffa is now, next door to Tel Aviv on the coast of Israel. I’ve been there, and I’ve been shown what is supposed to be the rock of sacrifice, “Andromeda’s Rock.” But I wouldn’t be too sure that it’s the real thing.

Achaca
Really, the Achaean League didn’t exist until long after this time, but I’m following Homer, who used the same anachronism for the Greek federation that went to war against Troy in his historical epic of the Bronze Age,
The Iliad
.

M
any thanks to Dana Facaros, whose excellent guidebook to the Greek Islands has been a good companion on all my trips to the Cyclades, for allowing me to use the quotations from a classic hymn to Charon as my “Dark Water” song in
chapter 3
. And to Gilly and Robin Cameron-Cooper, who rented us their beautiful house on Naxos, my writing retreat for the summer of 2005.

A
NN
H
ALAM
was born and raised in Manchester, England, and after graduating from Sussex University spent years traveling throughout Southeast Asia. She now lives in Brighton, England, with her husband and their son. Besides being a children’s author, Ann Halam writes adult science fiction and fantasy books as Gwyneth Jones. Her most recent title for Wendy Lamb Books was
Siberia
.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Text copyright © 2007 by Ann Halam
Map copyright © 2007 by Laura Brett

All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Laurel-Leaf, an imprint of Random House Children’s Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

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The Library of Congress has cataloged the hardcover edition
of this work as follows:
Halam, Ann.
Snakehead / Ann Halam.
p. cm.

Summary: Compelled by his father Zeus to accept the evil king Polydectes’s challenge to bring the head of the monstrous Medusa to the Aegean island of Serifos, Perseus, although questioning the gods’ interference in human lives, sets out, accompanied by his beloved Andromeda, a princess with her own harsh destiny to fulfill.
eISBN: 978-0-375-89533-3 (Gibraltar
lib. bdg.)
1. Perseus (Greek mythology)—Juvenile fiction. 2. Andromeda (Greek mythology)—Juvenile fiction. [1. Perseus (Greek mythology)—Fiction. 2. Andromeda (Greek mythology)—Fiction. 3. Gods, Greek—Fiction. 4. Goddesses, Greek—Fiction. 5. Mythology, Greek—Fiction. 6. Fate and fatalism—Fiction. 7. Seriphos Island (Greece)—Antiquities—Fiction. 8. Greece—History—To 146 B.C.—Fiction.] I. Title.
PZ7.H1283Sna 2008
[Fic]—dc22           
2007028318

RL: 6.7

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