If Greek gods are pop culture now, can an Ancient Egypt fad be far behind? Here are three reading suggestions to suit different readers or different moods.
The one that got me started was The Anubis Gates by Tim Powers, in which time-traveling tourist and Samuel Taylor Coleridge expert Professor Brendan Doyle visits England in the poetic heyday of Lord Byron, Coleridge, and William Ashbless and interrupts the plans of the ancient Egyptian sorcerer who has traveled there at the same time. An L.A. Times blogger wrote last fall about Tim Powers’ 1997 book On Stranger Tides being the basis for the fourth Pirates of the Caribbean movie starring Johnny Depp. The Anubis Gates is a literary romp replete with magic, science fiction, and a touch of ancient Egyptian legend.
A River in the Sky, a new Amelia Peabody mystery (#18) by Elizabeth Peters was released yesterday. I was curious, so I downloaded the first book in the series, Crocodile on the Sandbank, and listened to the audio version. Narrator Susan O’Malley perfectly embodies the bossy but kind-hearted bluestocking Amelia Peabody with ideas about archeology, ancient Egypt, and the rights of women. A fun romantic comedy with a mystery and archeological tidbits thrown in.
The Lost Army of Cambyses by Paul Sussman, a journalist and field archeologist, is an action-packed adventure with the most actual archeological information about ancient Egypt of the three. Like an Indiana Jones movie without the wacky, tongue-in-cheek stuff, it has professors, government officials, Egyptian and German villians, an Egyptian archeologist turned policeman, a handsome young archeologist, and a stubborn young woman — all in pursuit of a murderer and/or the greatest archeological discovery in Egyptian history. It’s bound to become a movie!
Check for The Anubis Gates in the Old Colony Library Network catalog here. Put a hold on A River in the Sky in the OCLN catalog here. Click here to request The Lost Army of Cambyses from the OCLN catalog.