Cleopatra's Daughter: A Novel

I like a good story. This one has a bit of everything, war, history, romance, royalty, slavery - so in a world of dissapointing stories lately, i give it a good solid B plus. The main character is likable,the narration is easy on the ears and the story does hold you. I don't think i'll relisten to it over and over or anything, but it was a good read. Which is saying a lot more than it sounds.

I was surprised by the number of good reviews this book has gotten. It's at best mediocre writing, with zero character development and no sense of even taking place in another era, much less historical accuracy. I wish I had seen the Amazon review that likened the title character (who tells the story) to a high school girl from modern Boston who fell asleep in history class the day they covered the Roman empire. Wanda McCaddon is a pro whose audio work I've previously enjoyed, but here her narration captures Selena perfectly--that is, it's annoying. Save your credit.

I expected this book to be a lot more dramatic. Instead it's just the story of a girl who grows up in the palaces of Rome. I found the characters hard to follow and the plot really slow. It did get more interesting towards the end, but it's a lot to get through. It was interesting enough to finish, and the factual evidence in the end made the story worth reading.

I liked the ending, but the story kind of meandered and it took forever to get there. Light and pretty good, but nothing spectatular. Good for a boring commute.

Well,I started this one time and quit about 45 minutes in and then went back to it recently to give it a second chance. It takes a while to get into. It is not an Egyptian story. It's the story of Cleopatra's children when they are taken to Rome by Octavian. Good detail, interesting story, several plot points added that are fabricated but good addition. Wraps up nice and the afterward has good historical detail tying it all together.

The story is pretty good but the narration by Wands McCaddon is a real bummer. Her high pitch English accent irratates the ear. If gets even more grating when she changes tones to indicate a different speaker. The book was recommended to me and I decided to listen rather than read. I now have the book and found reading the written page much more enjoyable

The narrator was very difficult to understand until about 2 hours in when I got used to her voice and accent. My first impression was that I was listening to a cross between Margaret Thatcher and Mrs. Doubtfire and I was unsure that I would be able to get through the book. HAVING said that, I did get used to her voice but the narrator of Michelle Moran's other books Nefertiti and The Heretic Queen had an amazing airy delivery that I would have preferred for this book as well.

I listened to this book on a cross country road trip with my sister-in-law, and I loved chatting about different cultural aspects the book covered. The age at which a child becomes an adult in this time period is much younger than now, and we found that royal/noble children were forced to grow up even more quickly. The book does a nice job of highlighting this coming of age.

Juba! His character is much more complex than I originally thought.

No, I think I needed time to process each section of the book - the material was fairly dense and we sometimes had to jog our memories to recall who a specific character was. I think if we had listened to it in one sitting, the characters would have jumbled together.

This novel covers quite a few deep themes: slavery, class, conquest over an enemy, love, teenage pregnancy, and more - it does rush through some of them, but overall does a nice job tackling these big topics.

I've listened and read to the previous two Egyptian books that Ms. Moran had written, and had high hopes for Cleopatra's Daughter. Ms. Moran didn't disappoint.

Following the story of Cleopatra Selene - starting only a day or so before the death of her parents - the tale follows through her time in Rome until her marriage. From the start Selene's life is one at risk, as is that of her twin brother. Caught in the middle of the political games of Octavian, neither twin knows how long they will be in Rome, if they will die, or what will eventually become of them.

A beautifully written story, and as an audio book it worked very well indeed. The narrator kept the feel of the story and didn't distract from it at all.

Interesting history lesson

Not sure

she was good, not sure if I remember any other of her performances

The man the daughter ended up marrying. He was a very interesting man.

This story just never grabbed me, the characters were not developed enough but the history I learned from the book was terrific. So I guess I would say, if this time in history is interesting to you, you should read the book. I hope this helps, I read this as a book for my book group and someone said the book was written for young readers which could be why it just didn't have what I would call depth.