The Golden One (edition 2003)

The Great War and the Great Game continue. This time the entire Emerson clan follows Ramses on his assignment to Gaza.

Meanwhile, they have hired a very competent, eager young, Egyptian girl, and her lazy, incompetent brother, who may be involved in the discovery and pilfering of a very important tomb. They are also having to deal with an obnoxious American famnily who seems bent on openly dealing in stolen antiquities.

All in all, it's just anoher season in Egypt for the Emersons, which is always a delight for readers! ( )

I'm addicted to this series of books, Amelia Peabody and her clan are a fantastic creation. The family once again gets entangled in murderous mayhem. Ramses gets sucked back into the Great Game, this time in Gaza and the family comes too. Along the way Ramses inadvertently manages to ensnare the heart of yet another susceptible young woman - Peters description of their parting is superb. Oh yes and there is a new addition to the family as Horus, surely the most superbly bad tempered cat in literature, brings home a kitten. Superb. ( )

Arriving in their home in Luxor in 1917, the Emerson family finds that a newly discovered royal tomb has been ransacked by thieves. A young girl, the sister of a helper on the dig, turns out to be much better at archaeology than her brother, who ends up being in league with bad guys when a dead body is found. The excitement does not end here as Ramses answers a call from British intelligence to help in Gaza, the gateway to the Holy Land. The family tags along in disguise and they pick up yet another young woman who is enamoured of Ramses as well as connect with Uncle Sethos, who is truly a good guy this time. Nefret's secret is an extension of the family. ( )

A while ago, I realised that I read this series, and most mystery serieses these days, as novels of setting and character, not as puzzles. Which was good, because this book was wonderful as a chance to spend more time with Amelia Peabody, family and friends. But as mystery, it left something to be desired. A few extremely incompetent and not at all mysterious tomb robbers, a couple of murders at the beginning that were immediately explained and that no-one really cared about anyways, and a completely unrelated spying diversion, also quite lacking in mystery. And the tomb-robber plot and the spy plot didn't really fit well together. I had the feeling that they were originally intended to be two books, and she awkwardly glued them together after realizing neither could support a book on its own. Really, rather carelessly done. ( )

Amelia Peabody #14 ( )