This book- I liked it, don't get me wrong but it just didn't quite fulfill my expectations. Maybe that's because i'm used to reading so many steamy romance or action packed adventure novels with strong sections of dialogue and action lately that I needed to adjust to how quite uneventful this was. It is a book that is more focused on the details of the settings and the time period and the mythology and beliefs of the ancient Egyptian society- which I totally loved reading.
The author did do a good job of keeping the book realistic by not having anything too over-dramatic or high fantasy but at the same time still linked in the gods,cultures and certain characters in history relating to the mythology. It is, I would say as realistic as a book about ancient Egypt can be because really any author that writes from the perspective of such a character as Nefertiti is really just guessing and improvising on the beliefs of those people and Friesner did a great job at that.
It doesn't seem to have much of a plot going on although i'm sure it will be greatly expanded on and put to conclusion in the second book. I'd say the story really picked up at about 4/5 into the book and then suddenly ended right in the middle of the some what only real action- a cliffhanger that didn't really make me want more. I will give it to the author for putting a real shocking twist to the character of Thutmose - just when I thought he'd turned into a sweetheart and I started to warm to his character when BAM! I too, like Nefertiti began to fall for Thutmose's charm and I was really annoyed and felt for Nefertiti when I realized it was all just a plot-scheme-act. Arghhh what a ****.
As for Nefertiti, I thought that throughout the book I would see her come of age and become a mature strong and defined character however there is nothing that really speaks volumes to me of her at all. she's too... hmmmm...bland for my liking. To me, with Nefertiti being such a grand and historic figure in history, she deserves to be a lot more definite, complex and developed.
Despite my criticism I am still going to read the next book 'Spinx's Queen' to see if the tale will draw to a satisfying end. Especially since there wasn't really a conclusion to the end of this book.
Also, one more thing that I would like to commend the author on and that is for the character Amenophis. He is a clumsy unattractive and a seemingly weak character but that is only his exterior. I love hot sexy attractive males in my fictions however the author did a grand job on avoiding having him inherit the "typical-male-protagonist syndrome" and steered clear from having Amenophis become that common stereotype, yet still managed to make me as the reader, love him for who he is. Kudos to dat.
No comments:
Post a Comment