I’ve also noticed a rash of current ‘novels’ that take stories from Greek and Roman Mythology and embellish them, trying to make the ‘gods’ more human and tell their back story.
I’ve loved the classic Myths and the characters since High School, so I gave ‘The Song of Achilles’ a shot. While it was well-written and held my attention, of course they had to bring in the ‘pretend fact’ that Achilles was gay. The book would’ve been just as good WITHOUT that cr@p.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11250317-the-song-of-achilles
Fer Pete’s Sake! Why? Why, why, why? Thank goodness I can then cleanse my brain with a manly man like Jack Reacher, or Travis McGee, LOL!
P.S. Tom Cruise is NOT Jack Reacher! The movies are awful! How could Lee Child (Author) go along with that! Aarrggg!
Also - ‘A Thousand Acres’ by Jane Smiley, was a fabulous re-telling of King Lear - as are any number of dysfunctional family novels. The ‘classics’ will always be the best story lines, IMHO. ;)
The source and genre is unimportant, only the agenda is. Imagine hat will someday soon happen in the revival of, say, Wallace and Gromit or Gumby and Pokey, or even a reboot of the Lego Movie.