The Stolen Queen by Fiona Davis

This book has a fun storyline, and all the details about ancient Egypt are interesting. But I didn’t like it all that much. After the first few chapters, I could tell that everything would probably turn out far too well, and it did. I can tolerate one or two unlikely coincidences to make the story work, but The Stolen Queen was full of them.

As I write this, I’m realizing that Dickens’s novels also tend to have rosy endings thanks to unrealistic circumstances, and yet I love Dickens. Perhaps it’s a difference in writing style – I adore Dickens’s super verbose prose – or maybe he does a better job of at least dragging the reader through some sorrow on the way to his happy endings. Whatever it was, somehow The Stolen Queen felt too happy and shallow.