This book had its good and its bad, but ultimately I couldn't get into it.

The best thing for me was the world-building. It was a future in which machines/AI have taken over most of the jobs, and there are a few big corporations that function like independent cities, all vying for more stakeholders by offering different things. The genomancy, albeit far-fetched, was a cool idea too, how a person's DNA could be changed to not just make them look different, but also to give them animal traits, to give them a certain skill, to do almost anything to the body.

I also liked the retelling aspect. It was clever how the author included a lot of stuff from the Jason and the Argonauts/Golden Fleece myth but turned it all into sci-fi stuff to fit with the story. For example, the "seers" were connected to the network with access to a bunch of data and were able to parse through it and see the probability of different outcomes.

I never connected to the characters though---maybe because of the omniscient POV, or maybe because they felt kind of one-sided, like they had one trait or belief and not much more personality beyond that.

But the worst thing for me was the romance. Jason was a jerk to Medea, he was judgmental, and overall he gave off this air of superiority. And Medea knew he was a jerk to her. Yet she was still swooning over his muscles and his eyes and his commanding nature and how he had the firm grip of a leader... even while their lives were in imminent danger. Then all the sudden they were having a heart to heart about their childhoods, and within the span of maybe two days, they went from being strangers who couldn't stand each other to promising to protect each other and being so in love they didn't want to live without the other.

And then, near the end, there was this stuff about how it's man's instinct to protect women, and it's woman's instinct to do whatever men tell them to, and just sexist/misogynistic things that left a bad taste in my mouth, especially after the questionable woman-secretly-wants-to-be-with-the-guy-who-treats-her-like-crap romance.

Overall, it had a lot of creativity, especially in the world, but I couldn't deal with the romance and how poorly the book portrayed women.

After I finished this, I was like Austin Powers: "Yes, Yes, Yes! NO NO!"

In theory this book was right up my alley: a science fiction take on the Greek legends of Jason, the Argonauts, the Golden Fleece, and of course Medea. The concept was strong and for a while the delivery was pretty good too. Midway through the book, though -- right around the time Medea and Jason started falling in love -- it started to slowly go downhill.

If I'm really being honest though, what ruined it more than anything was the ending. I know how the story of Jason and Medea is supposed to end. If you're not familiar with it, I'll give you a hint: it's about the least "happily ever after" ending you could come up with. Seriously, look it up if you don't know. I'll wait.

The "real" end of that story is one of the most spectacular acts of insane vengeance ever told. As this book went on I got more and more hyped up for that ending...and then I noticed how little I had left to read. It just boggles my mind that someone would set out to retell the story of Jason and Medea AND THEN LEAVE OUT THE MOST INTERESTING PART!

Despite all that, it wasn't a bad read. The story held together well, and except for the romance, it's reasonably well written. It was just an incredibly disappointing ending, because it didn't go to the actual end of the myth.