Women in Classical Video Games - (J.) Draycott, (K.) Cook (edd.) Women in Classical Video Games. Pp. xii + 271, figs, ills. London and New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2022. Cased, £95, US$130. ISBN: 978-1-350-24191-6 (book review)

This volume comprises fifteen chapters examining the representation of women in video games inspired by Classical antiquity. It is a fitting addition to the Bloomsbury Imagines series, which explores the reception of ancient subject matter in contemporary visual and performative media. As Cook and Draycott note in their introduction, the video game industry is the fastest growing in the world (Introduction, 1), providing useful material for Classical Reception scholars to examine people’s engagement with the ancient world. As a Classical Reception scholar with a particular interest in women’s history, I was excited to see a volume devoted to ancient women in video games, hoping that it would shed light on their mode of representation and subsequent societal attitudes towards women, both ancient and contemporary. This volume met and exceeded my expectations - I found it cohesive, accessible and informative, illuminating the real-world issue of the video game industry’s hostility towards women ‘both as individuals playing or working on games, and as characters represented within those games’ (Introduction, 1). While the individual chapters are well- written and thoroughly researched, the real strength of this book lies in the thematic interlinking and consistent dialogue between chapters, which provides the reader with various perspectives on the key tropes, stereotypes and modes of representation used to portray ancient women. [Final citation details to be advised.]