Aphrodite’s Breath: A Mother and Daughter’s Greek Island Adventure by Susan Johnson

Review by Irina Dunn

And now for the third of 12 Christmas book gift ideas…..

One of the great reading delights for me this year was Susan Johnson’s Aphrodite’s Breath, the story of how, at age 62, she took her 85-year-old mother Barbara and spent a year on Kythera, an island that is reputedly the birthplace of the love goddess.

Kythera is located at the southern end of the Peloponnese and it has generously donated thousands of its locals over the years to Melbourne and other cities of Australia, so the two islands have close relations.

It’s one thing to travel as a tourist in Greece, another to live amongst the Greeks and experience the inconveniences and discomfort of village life.

Susan Johnson was fed up with work, with motherhood, and with mortgages, and decided to ditch it all in an attempt to relive the youthful thrill she had experienced on her first visit to Kythera.

This doesn’t happen, of course, but another kind of magic is created in her developing relations with the locals, her discovery of new ways to see life, and her joyous appreciation of the beauties of the island.

Her mother is crabby, and says Susan is lecturing her, but even Barbara in the end has many wonderful memories to take away from the magical island of Kythera.

Aphrodite’s Breath: A Mother and Daughter’s Greek Island Adventure by Susan Johnson

Allen $ Unwin 2023