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Perfect Companion to the Peabody Books
| Customer Rating:  | This is a coffee table book filled with interesting essays to complement Elizabeth Peter's delightful Amelia Peabody Emerson mysteries about a family of archaeologists in Victorian and Edwardian Egypt.
The essays cover the history of Egyptology, the British in Egypt, and Islam, as well as housekeeping with servants, feminism, fashion, music, schooling, technological advances and popular fiction in the period. The book is also filled with engravings and photographs, including several pictorial essays.
These are fascinating. One features Shepheards, the Cairo hotel frequented by the British community during the period, which was burned in a demonstration in 1952.
There are also several lengthy reference lists, of (apparently all the) people mentioned in the Peabody books (both fictional and real), foreign words, Egyptology terms, and more. One essay is by Barbara Mertz (the Egyptologist behind the pen name of Elizabeth Peters) herself, another by Barbara Michaels (the pen name used by the prolific author for her romances). The design is by Dennis Forbes, editor of the popular Egyptology journal "KMT".
Interestingly, anyone not familiar with the Peabody books would find very little to indicate that Peabody/Emersons are fictional. Except for a list of the Peabody books, and opposite it a note on the copyright page "Peabody, Amelia (Fictitious character)" everything else implies that the intrepid Egyptologists were real and active during the Victorian and Edwardian periods, which is a nice touch.
There's also a useful list of further reading covering the various topics brought up in the essays.
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Great Reference
| Customer Rating: | | I read Amelia Peabody's Egypt with great enjoyment. The pictures depicting the Egypt of the Emerson books was delightful. I just finished the Ape who Guards the Balance and caught myself turning to AP's Egypt to fill out the pictures of Cairo and the Valley of the Kings. I found the descriptions and articles added a new dimension to my enjoyment of the book. I especially enjoyed the pages attributed to Emerson and the added postscript of when and where they were found hidden in a wall tomb. |
Fact and fiction, for Peabody fans
| Customer Rating: | This is a wonderful book for the fans of Amelia Peadbody Emerson, or any of the other characters in thed Peabody series. The are short biogs of the most frequently listed real people, and a 'who's who' of the books; many photos of the period and places and people; articles on many aspects of Egyptology relating mainly to the books; plus quite a large number of related subjects.
If one is reading the series, but has not read them all up to the publishing date of this (2003), it may be advisable to be a little careful in one or two places, as there are a (very) few details that give away part of the plots - so I was pleased I had read all of them before I read this.
If the plots don't worry you, this won't be a problem.
A very well presented, enormously educational book, which is more than able to be read for fun. Highly recommended.
MNWThe Mummy Case (Amelia Peabody Mysteries)Tomb of the Golden Bird (Amelia Peabody Mysteries)Crocodile on the Sandbank (Amelia Peabody, Book 1) |
Worth buying for Peabody fans
| Customer Rating: | I bought this because I am a recent convert to the Amelia Peabody books. I really enjoyed it and if you ar ea Peabody fan, it is worth buying. It helps to put people and places in contexts and offers an insight into Egypt at the time of the books.
My one small criticism is that I thought it could have had brief synopsis' of the books but that is probably just me, I liked it! |
never delivered
| Customer Rating: | I ordered this book for a Christmas gift and it wasn't ever delivered.
My sister likes Elizabeth Peters. I assume it is an odd work as it seemed to be out of print. |
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