Black Ships Before Troy

...And from Crete and Agros and Ithaca, from the mainland and the islands, the black ships put to sea...to fetch back Helen of the Fair Cheeks and take vengeance upon Troy, whose prince has carried her away.It begins with a golden apple and an impossible choice. Three great goddesses, Hera, Athene and Aprodite, ask Paris of Troy to decide who is the loveliest. Aphrodite bribes Paris with the promise of a wife as breathtaking as herself, so she wins the apple. But the only woman whose beauty equals Aphridite's is Helen- and she is already married to King Menelaus. The capture of Helen and the battles it unleashes is one of the greatest adventure stories of all time. Using the most up-to-date research on Troy and ancient Greece, master story teller Rosemary Sutcliff brings Homer's epic poem The Iliad to life. Alan Lee's dramatic images hauntingly recreate the age of heroes in the spellbinding introduction to the Greek classics.