Cleopatra VII has been an intense fascination of mine for more than two decades now. Consequently, I have devoured a significant number of books about this complex, mysterious, and intelligent woman. I can confidently say that Alberto Angela's book about her is, by far, the worst I have ever read, and probably the worst ever written. Not only did the book contain absolutely no information about the Egyptian queen that wasn't basically common knowledge (or at least readily available through a brief Google search), but the vast majority of the book wasn't even about her. It was about the men of that time: Caesar, Antony, and Octavian. This would have been fine, except the title indicates that the book is about Cleopatra. In my opinion, this is a case of blatant false advertising.
When Angela does get around to talking about Cleopatra, it actually gets worse. The majority of the time he spends on her is used to describe, in explicit detail, the queen's hips, legs, skin, eyes, buttocks, and breasts. This goes directly against the goal he sets for himself in his introduction of showing the reader how Cleopatra was more than just a pretty face. He does discuss the queen's education, upbringing, linguistic skills, and interest in culture. However, these passages are extremely high level and, as I've said before, contain no information that couldn't easily be found on Google. Mostly, it's lengthy paragraphs that describe Cleopatra's body, usually naked or barely clothed, as she gazes out at various sunsets, allows wind to whip through her hair, walks slowly across a mosaic floor, has makeup applied to her face by servants, and even, on one occasion, gets an oil massage. There are descriptions of sexual encounters between her and Julius Caesar, and her and Marc Antony, and even the discussion of her dead body mentions her sensual hips. Not only is none of this factually based, since we don't know what Cleopatra looked like and we certainly don't have any actual information about her sexual encounters, but it is sexualization to the point of being offensive, particularly when Angela specifically stated that he was going to focus on her intelligence and strategic skill instead of her beauty. Like, I signed up to read a history book, not an erotic novel.
Angela also states in his introduction that he wanted his book to be an immersive experience, so that the reader could feel like they were actually there, instead of just reading a book about history. His experimentation, or at least his execution of the concept, failed miserably. Angela's lack of skill as a writer, combined with the relatively sparse information he was working with, basically left him trying to stretch the book out as much as possible by stuffing it with filler in the form of repetition and condescending, redundant questions to the reader. "What was Cleopatra thinking at this moment?" I don't know. No one knows. We weren't there. "But what kind of education did the queen receive as a child?" You're the one writing the book. You tell me. The resulting effect is that basically Angela mansplains the entire book to the reader in a very repetitive and condescending way. If all the redundancies and repetitions had been properly edited out, the book would have been half the length that it currently is. Anyone who bought this book did not get their money's worth.
In short, Angela is not qualified to write this book, and it shows. This book is an insult to both Cleopatra herself, and to the intelligence of anyone who reads it. The fact that it was published is a travesty.