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DAUGHTER OF THE SEA by Madeleine Polland

DAUGHTER OF THE SEA

By

Pub Date: Jan. 5th, 1972
Publisher: Doubleday

There are two parallel stories here with heroines identical right down to their ""pale mists"" of blond hair. The first is Sarah, safely ensconced in a convent school where she nurtures -- simultaneously -- her guilt over her family's death in an automobile accident (she did suggest that they take that fatal route) and her love for a young Greek named Miklos, who has supposedly returned home to win his parents' consent to their marriage. Meanwhile (if that's the right word), the Bronze Age damsel Saran is rescued from a shipwreck off the coast of Crete by the handsome nobleman Mikolai and propitiously hailed as a daughter of Poseidon. By exploiting her supposed divinity, Saran manages to inspire the Cretans to revolt against the encroaching Hellenes (she herself kills the leading Greek by throwing a huge snake at him). Sarah may be included to make her historical counterpart more ""relevant,"" but the comparison only exposes the vacuity of both romantic fantasies and shows that the monumental stiffness of Polland's imagination is not limited to remote settings.