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Book Title: Nefertiti
Author: Nick Drake
Genre: thriller
Rating: 2/5

Summary (from book cover):

Power is like fire. It consumes everything. And when it is gone, all that's left is ash.

Nefertiti – the most beautiful, powerful and charismatic Queen of the ancient world. With her husband, Akhenaten, she rules over an Empire at the peak of its glory and domination. Together, they have built a magnificent new city in the desert on the banks of the Nile. They are about to host kings, dignitaries and leaders from around the Empire for a vast festival to celebrate their triumph.

But suddenly, Nefertiti vanishes.

Rahotep is the youngest chief detective of the Thebes division; a Seeker of Mysteries who knows about shadows and darkness, and who can see patterns where others cannot. His unusual talents earn him a summons to the royal court. Rahotep is given ten days to find the Queen and return her in time for the festival. Success will bring glory - but if he fails, he and his young family will die...

My thoughts: I was so disappointed with this book. It never convinced me the story was set on Ancient Egypt. In first place, the style of writing, as a journal, seemed more like a noir movie, where not even the femme fatale was missing. In second place, words like "villa" and "forensic" seemed anachronisms as the idea one has of a "villa" was born it the Roman era, meaning, almost a millennium after the time in which the action of this book supposedly takes place, and the word "forensic" shows the same problem, as it appears as well with Latin, to name the debate in front of a forum and not, so much, the material evidences of crimes. Only the character's names and the historic plot would call my attention to the fact that the chronology was, somewhat, related to the Ancient Egypt.

With only a few days to the inauguration of the new city of Akhetaten, Nefertiti disappears putting in risk the stability of Akhenaten's, her husband, government already somewhat weakened due to economic difficulties and external pressures. Rahotep is then called by the pharaoh to solve the mystery and return the Queen in time for the festival. In between the "detective" meets some draw backs, mostly due to the political games of the court.

Despite the expectations, these were dashed as it has little mystery and, although it sheds some lights over these troubled times in Ancient Egypt, it doesn't satisfy as well in historical terms. It seemed to have potential for much more, but not even the fact that the main character needed to act against the clock grabbed me. The characters were somewhat one-dimensional and even Nefertiti seemed to have little charisma. We knew she was like a pillar of the new government and religion, but that isn't showed that much and even her disappearing didn't sound according to her profile. If the author wanted to present a strong woman, capable of taking the reigns of government and use her disappearance from historical registries to then put her as regent and successor to Akhenaten, he could have done it some other way, namely with this character as the main one.