Necessity: A Novel

"There’s a matter-of-fact surety to Jo Walton’s books that makes the most implausible ideas seem as prosaic and sensible as warm socks. In her Thessaly trilogy, wrapping with the marvelous Necessity, the goddess Athena has stolen dreamers from throughout time to found an ideal city per the dictates of Plato’s Republic. The philosophical debates — starring a good-humored Socrates — are thought-provoking, but Walton never loses sight of her characters in all the heady thoughts about consent, education, responsibility and equality. These books move fleetly, with irresistible humor and action, and some fascinating perspective on the lives of gods."