Wonder Woman's Book of Myths

Wonder Woman

by Clare Hibbert

DC Comics' super heroine introduces young readers to the world of classical Greek mythology in this exciting DK Reader. Wonder Woman tells the stories of her favorite gods and goddesses, and their impact on her own adventures.

Genres: Wonder Woman, Superheroes, Mythology, Historical Fiction

48 pages, Paperback

First published February 16, 2004

Reviews

[Mimi]

Mediocre, and hardly a decent introduction to myths, more a list of myths that were used in jla/wonder woman stories. And as usual in popular culture, they use one part of the myth, and present it as the whole story...
The book is okay if you like the DC Universe, not so great if you're looking for a kids intro to myths.

[Marsha]

While I’m an admirer of the Wonder Woman creation, I have to admit I haven’t delved wholeheartedly into her stories. I’ve nothing against the Amazonian princess. Nowadays, comic book tales and their cinematic counterparts just don’t hold as much interest for me as more traditional storytelling.

But this book reminds me that comic book writers take their inspiration from wherever they can get it. The results from such appropriations can be spectacular, whimsical, mind boggling, weird, hilarious or awe inspiring, depending on the mood of the artist.

Wonder Woman has her fictional origin in Greek mythology, already giving her a solid background of supernatural tales from which to create ever-new stories. Even her origin myth gets the occasional new slant. In one graphic novel, her mother crafts her from clay and then Hippolyta’s song causes the gods to rain silver and gold tears into the little golem, imbuing it with life. In another, Zeus takes Hippolyta as one of his mortal lovers, making himself Diana’s father. In this anthology, Hermes breathes into Hippolyta’s Claymation figure, causing it to come alive.

In this DK book, the writers take a quick peek into various other religions, mythos and fables from around the world that inspired new tales featuring Wonder Woman. There are even tales from the Americas, a field that is rich for the taking, given the multitude of religions and beliefs of the myriad indigenous tribes. (Admittedly, this book doesn’t mention anything of European mythology. There are no sprites, elves, banshees, morrigans, kelpies, e.g. Guess you can’t have everything.)

This main focus of DK Readers is about helping children to read. If that means skewing the reading matter towards their particular interests, then it makes sense that Wonder Woman, with her courage, her compassion towards friends and foes, her willingness to rescue and aid as many as she can, be a part of that mission. Who wouldn’t want to read about someone like that?

[Libby]

After two pages of Wonder Woman, we move on to 30 pages of Greek Gods, two pages of monsters, four pages of Indian gods, two pages of Egyptian deities, two pages of American myths, and end with a nice glossary. Not to shabby for an easy reader. I think this one will be a pretty interesting teaching tool, but I'm not so sure how a browsing patron will feel if they take the book home without looking at it closely before borrowing it.

[Heather]

This book tells about Greek myths and the Greek Gods. Each page about a God has historical art, and art from their appearance in the Wonder Woman comics. We also get trivia of each God's interaction with Wonder Woman. A smaller section in the book tells about Egyptian, Hindu, and Native American Gods.