Cleopatra Ascending (Shadow's Edge Series #2)

by Maureen Lipinski

Overview

"The queen lives again. You, Rhea, are the key to unlocking the magical artifacts in Cleopatra's tomb." Despite having a shaman, a witch, and a muse for sisters, Rhea Spencer feels like a normal teenager-even if she is the reincarnation of Cleopatra, the Egyptian queen. But everything changes on her sixteenth birthday, when visions of a life she lived more than two thousand years ago become real and the queen's secret world unfolds around her. Declan-a mysterious figure from the Order of Antony-appears at her doorstep to warn Rhea that she is in terrible danger. A sinister cabal known as the Octavians will do anything to obtain her growing powers. Rhea must travel to Egypt, the exotic land where an ancient war began, to stop the Octavians from unleashing a deadly force that could destroy the world.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780738733319
Publisher:	North Star Editions
Publication date:	01/08/2013
Series:	Shadow's Edge Series , #2
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	240
File size:	3 MB
Age Range:	12 - 17 Years

About the Author

Maureen Lipinski (Lombard, IL) is also the author of Shadow’s Edge (Flux), A Bump in the Road (St. Martin’s Press), and Not Ready for Mom Jeans (St. Martin’s Press). Visit her online at MaureenLipinski.com.

Maureen Lipinski (Lombard, IL) is also the author of Shadow’s Edge (Flux), A Bump in the Road (St. Martin’s Press), and Not Ready for Mom Jeans (St. Martin’s Press). Visit her online at MaureenLipinski.com.

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Editorial Reviews

"Rhea is both an entertaining narrator and a compelling heroine, whom readers will increasingly enjoy rooting for ..." —Kirkus Reviews

From the Publisher

Gr 7 Up—There's something a little unusual about 16-year-old Rhea and her sisters. One's a witch, one a shaman, the youngest is a muse, and Rhea is the reincarnation of Cleopatra. This impacts her life very little, until a team of archaeologists closes in on the location of Cleopatra's tomb, and suddenly Rhea's life and liberty are in danger. Luckily, Mark Antony established an order of protectors for Cleopatra before his death, and Rhea's boyfriend, Slade, is a tall hunk of shape-shifting paranormal dreaminess who just loves to come to her rescue. Unfortunately, bad writing turns what could have been an entertaining story into a baffling muddle. The author often knocks her main character unconscious in order to change the setting or move the story along, and it is readers who may experience the disorientation that one might expect of Rhea in these situations. Certain words are overused to the point of parody-many characters open or close their eyes "slowly," and clumsy sentences are sometimes unintentionally hilarious. There is consistent confusion about how to form a plural possessive. It sometimes seems that there may be an actual story happening somewhere adjacent to this book, perhaps in the mysteriously named Other Realm(s) that Slade and Rhea's sister Leah keep disappearing to, and in fact the first book in this series, Shadow's Edge (Flux, 2012), was about Leah. Rhea's book, however, reads like a hasty afterthought.—Paula Willey, Baltimore County Public Library, Towson, MD

School Library Journal

Readers who enjoyed Leah Spencer's mystical adventures in the first series outing, Shadow's Edge (2012), will find even more to love in the second. For a Spencer sister, Rhea lives a relatively normal life. Sure, she's the reincarnation of Cleopatra, and her boyfriend, Slade, is a shape-shifter and future king of the Dark Créatúir, but up until her 16th birthday, Rhea has gone to school, bickered with her sisters and done household chores just like any typical high school student. However, as soon as Rhea turns 16, she begins to have visions of her former life as an Egyptian queen. Alas, Rhea isn't the only one intrigued by her growing powers. Soon she finds herself caught up in a war between two ancient, secret orders, one determined to protect the Egyptian queen reincarnate and the other hellbent on harnessing her powers for their own dark and deadly purposes. Rhea is both an entertaining narrator and a compelling heroine, whom readers will increasingly enjoy rooting for as she begins to embrace her fate and battle to protect the ones she loves. Unfortunately (and astonishingly, given the genre), the novel misses an opportunity to explore a potentially intriguing love triangle involving Rhea, Slade and Declan, the handsome young member of the Order of Antony who is determined to protect Rhea, often in spite of herself. Still, this is an entertaining, quick read. (Fantasy. 12-15)

Kirkus Reviews