Summary

Coco Mellors opens Cleopatra and Frankenstein with a conversation between two unnamed characters—a man and a woman who met in an elevator after a New Year’s Eve party. Mellors uses third-person limited omniscient and shifts from each of their perspectives as they formed initial impressions. After flirtatious banter, the woman introduced herself as Cleo and the man mused that her name was fitting, since Cleopatra was the “original undoer of men” (3). The man, Frank, then joked his name could be short for Frankenstein since he was a “creator of monsters” (3). Cleo and Frank walked together down a street in New York, where the novel is set, until they entered a bodega. Frank bought Cleo a pack of cigarettes and asked if he could walk her home.

Through dialogue, readers learn Frank founded an ad agency and was older than Cleo, who recently...