The last novel H. Rider Haggard wrote during his lifetime, Queen of the Dawn sweeps readers into ancient Egypt during the violent invasion of the Shepherd Kings, when a foreign dynasty massacres the royal line and seizes the throne. Princess Nefra, daughter of the fallen Pharaoh, is hidden by a secret religious order and raised in shadow, unaware of her royal blood. But destiny finds her anyway: she meets and falls in love with a young man who is none other than the disguised son of the very usurper who destroyed her family. Their forbidden love blossoms in secret temples and crumbling palaces, until war and revelation force them to choose between passion and birthright. The novel moves from political intrigue to brutal battlefields, from tender romance to torture and imprisonment, building toward an adventure-fiction climax that Haggard's devoted readers knew to expect.
