{"id":3781,"date":"2014-06-11T10:00:00","date_gmt":"2014-06-11T15:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/booksyalove.com\/?p=3781"},"modified":"2020-07-09T10:43:23","modified_gmt":"2020-07-09T15:43:23","slug":"target-practice-by-mike-maihack-book-review-cleopatra-in-space-talking-cats-alien-war","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/?p=3781","title":{"rendered":"Target Practice, by Mike Maihack (book review) &#8211; Cleopatra in Space! Talking cats! Alien war!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"3999\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/?attachment_id=3999\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/booksyalove.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/Cleopatra-in-Space1.jpg?fit=714%2C1063&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"714,1063\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/booksyalove.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/Cleopatra-in-Space1.jpg?fit=687%2C1024&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"alignright wp-image-3999\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/booksyalove.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/Cleopatra-in-Space1-201x300.jpg?resize=302%2C450\" alt=\"book cover of Target Practice: Cleopatra in Space #1 by Mike Maihack published by Graphix\" width=\"302\" height=\"450\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/booksyalove.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/Cleopatra-in-Space1.jpg?resize=201%2C300&amp;ssl=1 201w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/booksyalove.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/Cleopatra-in-Space1.jpg?resize=687%2C1024&amp;ssl=1 687w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/booksyalove.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/Cleopatra-in-Space1.jpg?w=714&amp;ssl=1 714w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 302px) 100vw, 302px\" \/>Good aim, quick reflexes,<br \/>\nsneaking out of class,<br \/>\nyes, Cleo is sure the rules don&#8217;t apply to her!<\/p>\n<p>We all know about <a href=\"http:\/\/www.history.com\/topics\/ancient-history\/cleopatra\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Cleopatra<\/a> as queen of Egypt, but imagine her teen years &#8211; with time travel and intergalactic war and talking cats as teachers (yes, 15 year olds in the future have to go to school&#8230;)<\/p>\n<p>Sample this action-packed graphic novel <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cowshell.com\/cleopatra\/2014\/05\/04\/target-practice-pg-1\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">here<\/a> free (thanks, Mike!), then head to your <a href=\"http:\/\/www.worldcat.org\/libraries\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">local library<\/a> or <a href=\"http:\/\/www.indiebound.org\/indie-store-finder\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">independent bookstore<\/a> for the rest of the tale.<\/p>\n<p>Alas, we&#8217;ll have to wait until April 2015 for the second in this #diversebooks series: <em>The Thief and the Story<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>So, <a href=\"http:\/\/booksyalove.com\/?cat=89\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">alternate history<\/a> &#8211; thumbs up or thumbs down?<\/p>\n<p>**kmm<\/p>\n<p><strong>Book info<\/strong>: Target Practice (Cleopatra in Space #1)\u00a0 \/ text and art by Mike Maihack. Graphix, 2014.\u00a0 [<a href=\"http:\/\/www.cowshell.com\/cleopatra\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">author site<\/a>]\u00a0 [<a href=\"http:\/\/www.scholastic.com\/browse\/book.jsp?id=1321007\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">publisher site<\/a>]\u00a0 [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=49CWtWCg0_w&amp;feature=youtu.be\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">book trailer<\/a>] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.<\/p>\n<p><strong>My book talk<\/strong>: Curiosity sends Cleopatra from ancient Egypt to outer space where the teen is hailed as savior of the galaxy &#8211; if she survives training school!<\/p>\n<p>If she hadn&#8217;t slipped away from boring algebra (does a queen really need math?) for slingshot practice with her pal Gozi, then 15-year-old Cleopatra wouldn&#8217;t have found the old temple or the glowing tablet there which transported her from the ancient Nile Valley to the future, where talking cats explain her prophesied arrival.<\/p>\n<p>At Yasiro Academy, Cleo learns alien languages (yawn), algebra (snore), and target practice (ray guns!) as she prepares for intergalactic war against Xerx who is capturing all knowledge stored electronically &#8211; and their sector is next!<\/p>\n<p>First graphic novel in the Cleopatra in Space series, <em>Target Practice<\/em>\u00a0 shows the young queen-to-be facing danger from school dances, warring aliens, and her own impetuous nature.\u00a0\u00a0 (One of 6,000 books recommended on <a href=\"http:\/\/www.abookandahug.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">www.abookandahug.com<\/a>)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Good aim, quick reflexes, sneaking out of class, yes, Cleo is sure the rules don&#8217;t apply to her! We all know about Cleopatra as queen of Egypt, but imagine her teen years &#8211; with time travel and intergalactic war and talking cats as teachers (yes, 15 year olds in the future have to go to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[89,19,80],"tags":[22,4,202,11,45,16,18,44,46,43,49,67,15,9,21,66,35,33,119,6,28],"class_list":["post-3781","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-alternate-history","category-fiction","category-graphic-novel","tag-behavior","tag-belonging","tag-blogathon2014","tag-communication","tag-competition","tag-determination","tag-family","tag-friendship","tag-funny","tag-growing-up","tag-memories","tag-outer-space","tag-relationships","tag-school","tag-self-image","tag-series","tag-surprises","tag-survival","tag-time-travel","tag-travel","tag-villains"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3781","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3781"}],"version-history":[{"count":18,"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3781\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11537,"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3781\/revisions\/11537"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3781"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}