I bought this book for the Patricia McKillip novella, but was unfortunately disappointed. I love stories about art, artists, and artists' models, but this story was muddled with too many characters and a fantastical element that just was not necessary. (Spoilers follow)

Tom is an artist who dreams of another artist's wife and model as his own ideal subject struggles for new inspiration. He decides to paint his idol's mouth, which then starts speaking to him as Medusa, claiming that the artist invoked her. She's on Tom's side, and tells him to go find another model. Tom then finds Jo, a model who had once sat for him, whom he no longer recognizes because the tragic year she has experienced (illegitimate baby that has died, and near starvation on the streets) has resulted in her appearance changing somewhat. Tom wants to paint Jo as Medusa, but fears that if they talk and get to know each other, he'll lose the vision of her that he's convinced will make his career. Eventually he learns to see her as a person, and also begins to get to know his original idol, who like Jo has had a rough start in life.

My question is, why was Medusa's spirit even necessary? The artist's housekeeper, who shows kindness to Jo because she knows that poor young women are often taken advantage of, could have urged Tom to take an interest in Jo. It seems to me this book had three points: you need to see people, even the unnaturally beautiful ones, as people; Medusa may have been misrepresented in myth; and the poor, especially women, were treated like crap in this time period. The problem for me is that these three points had nothing to do with each other, and seemed merely thrown together in a single story. ( )

An artist turns to the Gorgon for inspiration. The story runs a bit long and just keeps going on and on. ( )