Category: Book Review
Cleopatra VII: Daughter of the Nile by Kristiana Gregory
(Cover picture courtesy of Elmhurst.)
3 Januarius, Morning
I could feel my insides shaking. Would this sister try to poison me? Yes, I believe so. As for my other older sister, Berenice—never! She and I adore each other even though I am eight years younger.
I took the cup and raised it toward Tryphaena as if toasting her, but really I was watching the liquid, looking for oil floating on its surface, or powder sticking to the sides of the cup. If I suspected poison and tossed it into the pool, she would have her guards behead me on the spot. If it was indeed poison, one sip and I could die…
My eyes closed as I took the first sip, as if savoring such an excellent taste, but really my thought was, O Isis, I am afraid….My stomach turned with nervousness, or was it from a fearsome death beginning in me?
The Royal Diaries series is a great one for young girls to learn about the lives of famous women. And no woman is more famous than Cleopatra VII, who has become a cultural phenomenon. So who was she? What was she like as a child? Kristiana Gregory tries to answer that question by writing a diary from Cleopatra’s own point of view.
What I like about Cleopatra VII: Daughter of the Nile is that it doesn’t feel like you’re reading a diary. It feels like you’re seeing the events happen in real time as Cleopatra describes them, unlike some of the other books in the series. Kristiana Gregory obviously put a lot of research into her novel and it shines through in the little details about ancient Egyptian life. The narrative takes a different direction than a lot of books about Cleopatra’s younger years as it shows her going to Rome with her father, which may or may not be true—after all, it is ancient history. This is where she meets Marc Antony and helps her father, who speaks no Latin, navigate Roman politics.
Readers will fall in love with Cleopatra. She’s resourceful, strong and is, at the same time, a teenage girl at heart. She falls in love, she gets scared, she doubts herself…most readers will be able to relate to her.
The only caveat I have about this book is the religious aspect. Cleopatra admires Nefertiti and Akhenaten for their monotheism, even though no one by the Ptolemaic period would have had any clue who they were as the city they built (Akhetaten) was torn apart brick by brick and used in other Pharaohs’ monuments.
I give this book 4.5/5 stars.
Artemis Fowl: The Lost Colony by Eoin Colfer
(Cover picture courtesy of Reader Store.)
Thousands of years ago, fairies and humans fought a great battle for the magical island of Ireland. When it became clear that they could not win, all of the fairies moved belowground—all except for the 8th Family, the demons. Rather than surrender, they used a magical time spell to take their colony out of time and into Limbo. There they have lived for decades, planning their violent revenge on humans.
Now the time spell is unraveling, and demons are beginning to materialize without warning on Earth. If humans were to find out about them, all fairies would be exposed. To protect themselves, the fairies must predict when the next demon will materialize. But in order to do so, they will have to decipher temporal equations so complicated, even a great brain like Foaly can’t understand them. But he knows someone who can: Artemis Fowl.
So when a very confused demon imp appears in a Sicilian theater, Artemis is there to meet him. But he is not alone. Someone else has unlocked the secrets of the fairy world and managed to solve complex mathematical problems that only a genius could. And she is only twelve years old…
The Lost Colony is probably one of my favourite Artemis Fowl books, aside from The Eternity Code. I love how Artemis is finally given a run for his money by a twelve-year-old girl and how his plans turn out far from perfect for once. He makes mistakes and finally, in some respects, actually behaves like a normal teenage boy who’s going through that dreaded time in everyone’s life: puberty.
New characters like N°1 and Doodah Day are very colourful and add a lot of depth to Eoin Colfer’s fantastic world where fairies are real and dangerous. Of course, old favourites like Foaly, Holly, Butler and Juliet return and continue along their character arcs. Artemis himself changes quite a bit and gains sympathy for other people, which has been hinted at in earlier books, but really shows through in The Lost Colony. Of course he’s still manipulative when he needs to be, but the difference is that he feels guilt over it.
There were truly unexpected plot twists and Eoin Colfer used the demon island in Limbo to expand upon the history of the fairies, particularly why they went underground. I was up reading The Lost Colony until early in the morning and I have to say that I didn’t regret it one bit because it was well-written, entertaining and the characters were sympathetic.
I give this book 5/5 stars.
Magyk by Angie Sage
(Cover picture courtesy of My Escape From The Real World.)
Septimus Heap, the seventh son of the seventh son, disappears the night he is born, pronounced dead by the midwife. That same night, the baby’s father, Silas Heap, comes across an abandoned child in the snow—a newborn girl with violet eyes. The Heaps take her into their home, name her Jenna, and raise her as their own. But who is this mysterious baby girl, and what really happened to their beloved son Septimus?
Some people have been calling Angie Sage’s Septimus Heap series “the next Harry Potter.” Honestly, those words have been thrown around so carelessly that I don’t think they have meaning anymore. Magyk and the other six books in the series are good, but they’re certainly not on the level of Harry Potter.
Magyk is for ages nine and up and I think kids around that age will really enjoy the series. Angie Sage has created a quas-Medieval world (with plenty of twists and diversity) populated with all kinds of characters that kids will love. Her plotting is decent enough and does throw some unexpected twists, but a lot of the ‘twists’ were predictable, even when I was in the target age group. Obviously, Septimus is still alive. I mean, it’s called the Septimus Heap series. Still, there were a few pleasant surprises and most kids won’t be able to see them coming.
Aunt Zelda, Jenna, Silas, Boy 412 and Marcia are all colourful characters. They may seem a bit shallow to older readers, but Angie Sage’s target age group will love them. As a bonus, this isn’t your typical children’s book where the adults have it all wrong: the adults help the main characters (who are children). Magyk also has great messages about believing in yourself and you can’t judge people by their appearances. The writing style is a bit more simplistic than other books aimed at the 9-12 age group, but the plot, world-building and characterization more than make up for it.
I give this book 3.5/5 stars.
Matilda by Roald Dahl
(Cover picture courtesy of Melville House Books.)
Who put superglue in Dad’s hat? Was it really a ghost that made Mom tear out of the house? Matilda is a genius with idiot parents—and she’s having a great time driving them crazy. But at school things are different. At school there’s Miss Trunchbull, two hundred menacing pounds of kid-hating headmistress. Get rid of the Trunchbull and Matilda would be a hero. But that would take a superhuman genius, wouldn’t it?
This is probably one of my favourite children’s books of all time and I still re-read it once a year or so. It was one of the books I read aloud to my little sister to get her interested in reading and will always hold a special place in my heart, like many of Roald Dahl’s books.
Matilda is the embodiment of everything children want to be and she does things they long to do: she stands up to adults, stands up for herself and proves that adults aren’t always in the right. At the same time, this isn’t an adult-bashing book because we have the lovely Miss Honey who is shown as a kind, caring woman who loves children.
Miss Trunchbull is her exact opposite and is the teacher (technically, headmistress or principal) out of every kid’s worst nightmare. This being a children’s book, her behavior is over-the-top, but in my experience, some of her behaviors are not far off what really terrible teachers do.
Matilda is a classic children’s novel, as it should be. It’s funny, teaches important life lessons and is incredibly entertaining. Parents, if you want to read aloud to your seven or eight year olds, this is the perfect book to choose. Both you and your children will enjoy this hilarious novel written by one of the greatest children’s writers ever. As a bonus, the movie is a great adaptation of the book if you want to see your favourite characters come to life.
I give this book 5/5 stars.
The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova
(Cover picture courtesy of Reading with Tequila.)
Breathtakingly suspenseful and beautifully written, The Historian is the story of a young woman plunged into a labyrinth where the secrets of her family’s past connect to an inconceivable evil: the dark fifteenth-century reign of Vlad the Impaler and a time-defying pact that may have kept his awful work alive through the ages. The search for the truth becomes an adventure of monumental proportions, taking us from monasteries and dusty libraries to the capitals of Eastern Europe—in a feat of storytelling so rich, so hypnotic, so exciting that it has enthralled readers around the world.
With a premise centred around Dracula, a novel is generally a hit-and-miss. However, Elizabeth Kostova actually managed to pull it off and this was definitely a hit.
While the premise may attract many people, I have to say that the writing style isn’t for everyone. It’s very descriptive and you really can picture yourself in all of the places described, but some people might find it overly-descriptive. In historical fiction I don’t mind such things and the descriptive writing style really appealed to me because many of the settings in the novel are completely foreign to me. Elizabeth Kostova’s writing hooks you in and slowly builds up the suspense while you wait for the shoe to drop—which it eventually does, at an unexpected time.
This is a book you really, really have to pay attention to. I would definitely not recommend reading it when you’re tired because the plot is incredibly complicated in a blink-and-you-miss sort of way. There are a couple of intersecting stories from different eras, which can be confusing at times, but works surprisingly well in The Historian overall.
The characters are amazing. We don’t meet Dracula himself for very long, but he is definitely a memorable character, as are pretty much all of the characters we come across. Elizabeth Kostova has this way of making her characters come alive, even though all we learn about some of them is through the stories of the main characters. It’s sort of how we learn about Lestat and other characters in Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles and in this case, it’s highly effective.
I give this book 4/5 stars.