Review: Cleopatra

Cleopatra by Saara El-Arifi
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Narrated by Adjoa Andoh
Presented by Harper Collins UK Audio

Mixed but mostly negative feelings about the audio. I think she actually did a (mostly) brilliant job but it just wasn't for me.

The story itself was a bit disappointing to me, as I think it tried too hard to make her a sympathetic character. Cleopatra has always seemed like such a badass of history, and this rounds her out a bit more, but with tales of woe and hardship rather than steel. There's a huge focus on her as a mother and a lover, and I wanted more of her as a ruler. I guess that's kind of the point of the story - to offer the bits history doesn't - but to me it watered down the character into less than I expected.

I was also increasingly frustrated every time the story referred to things yet to come. While Cleopatra is such an iconic figure from history, I think there are many who don't know all the details of her life so it ends up spoiling a lot of big moments. I'm one of them - I know her as a badass queen but not too much about the details, and I was excited to learn more through this medium. So naturally, many of the references were big spoilers. I HATE SPOILERS. I'm the kind of person who doesn't even want to know how a book made you feel because it's a spoiler on how I might feel reading it.

I'm in two minds as to how I would go with the physical, compared to the audio. On the one hand, I think I would have appreciated Cleopatra as a person a little more, but I also think I would have been even more bored with the length of the story. This really does travel, giving plenty of detail of Cleopatra's life, and while it's nice to hear about everything, it does make it long and a little tedious at times. I enjoy audio for books like this, because I can zone out a little without missing much. But I always get a richer experience with reading physically so this may have led to a better impression of the character.

The narration itself was very hit/miss for me. I enjoyed the strength of her voice and its representation of the character, but at times it didn't seem to suit. Some of the pronunciations bothered me, and I felt sometimes it was a little more dramatic than necessary. But then at other times I was completely swept away by the performance, feeling true anguish when the character experienced it. I'd want to listen to this narrator on another book to see how it differs.

I did enjoy the story, but it didn't capture me quite as much as I wanted it to, and I wanted to hear more of the coldhearted queen of history. Still, it's stirred up more interest in researching the historical woman so that's never a bad thing! I'd definitely still encourage people with an interest in the Egyptian Queen to give this book a go.

With thanks to NetGalley for an audio ARC

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