Title: The Sultan of Monte Cristo
Author: The Holy Ghost Writer
Source: bought on amazon
Rating: ★☆☆☆☆
Review Summary: The writing style was similar to the original, but the plot was boring, unbelievable, bizarre, and not true to the spirit of the original.
This book is supposed to be a sequel to The Count of Monte Cristo. My review contains some spoilers for this book but none for the original.
Initially, I actually had high hopes for this book. From the first few pages it was clear that the author had done a good job capturing Dumas’ writing style. The language was flowery, Dantes was arrogant, and Hadee subservient. Not my favorite things about Dumas but integral to his work and well represented here. However… The book opens with a blatant sex scene between Dantes and Haydee. Now, I don’t have a problem with sex scenes in principle, but nothing like this happens in the original. More than that, I thought the ambiguous nature of Dantes’ relationship with Haydee was part of the first book’s appeal. Continue reading