"Mummies in the Morning" written by Mary Pope Osborne is a book about mummies and pyramids in ancient Egypt. Jack and Annie, who are siblings, travel back in time via a magic tree house. This adventure leads them on their way to pyramids, which are also referred to as the House of the Dead. Jack and Annie witness a funeral parade, a sled carrying a coffin led by four oxen. At least, they think they do. They carefully decide to enter the pyramid. Once inside, they are sure there are ghosts among them. The haunting idea becomes a ghastly reality when standing before them is a ghost-queen. She is in desperate need of their help to get through the Underworld, and the children are willing to try their best. And so the real adventure begins. As the story unfolds, readers will learn a few interesting facts about the way Egyptians preserved and honored their dead. Osborne incorporates a factual book at the hands of Jack, who does refer to it throughout the story and offer some truths. The author writes the story in a suspenseful tone, with quick and simple dialogue. This kind of story makes it hard for the reader to put it down. I would suggest anyone read this book and see what becomes of the dynamic duo and the queen. ( )

Mummies in the Morning
The book that I decided to use for an example of the contributions of non-western or ancient cultures to science, technology, or engineering is Mummies in the Morning, written by Mary Pope Osborne and illustrated by Sal Murdocca. This book is part of the Magic Tree House series. The books included in this series are interesting because each story involves a set of two books; one fiction and one non-fiction. The fiction book tells a story that briefly touches on the key elements that the author wants to focus on, while the non-fiction book includes many more details, and relates the story back to actual facts. The correlating book in this particular set is called Mummies and Pyramids. There are three main characters in this book: Jack, Annie, and Queen Hutepi. Jack and Annie are siblings who stumble upon a tree house near their home that they feel is magic. This tree house helps them to allow their imagination to take them on all kinds of wild adventures. The siblings reveal that already this week they had visited with knights and dinosaurs thanks to this tree house and its contents. The other main character is an ancient mummy queen by the name of Hutepi. The Queen reveals that she needs the help of the siblings in order to find The Book of the Dead, which she needs to be able to pass through the Underworld.
This book has two main settings: the tree house, which is located in Pennsylvania, and the tomb of Queen Hutepi, which is located in ancient Egypt. There is not much physical description of the tree house other than the fact that it is abandoned and full of books. The contents of the books are actually what inspire all of the different adventures. The cover of the book that inspired this particular adventure consisted of a picture of a pyramid with a parade of Egyptians going toward it. Among the parade were four huge cows that were carrying a sled that was holding a box. The siblings did not know it at the time, but they were actually looking at a picture of a funeral parade, which was part of the customs of ancient Egyptians. The description of the tomb is very similar to what one might traditionally think a tomb would be like. It was described as being very dark, cool, musty, and scary.
As I have sort of already alluded to, the plot of this story follows Jack and Annie along their Egyptian adventure in which they help Queen Hutepi find the book of the dead so that she can pass through the Underworld. After the siblings meet the Queen, they find out that her brothers hid the book so that grave robbers could not find it, but that luckily they wrote clues as to where it was on the wall in hieroglyphics. Since neither Jack nor Annie is familiar with this method of writing, they describe the symbols to the Queen so that she can translate them. They determine that the four symbols represent stairs, a boat, a jug, and a folded cloth. The Queen then leads the siblings to her burial chambers where they follow the clues to find the book. However, once they have finished their task and are attempting to leave, they encounter a few wrong turns so-to-speak, but eventually they make it safely back to the tree house. This book is probably appropriate for a third grade level and up, and I would definitely recommend it for any lesson dealing with ancient Egypt. The thing that I really like about it is the fact that this book comes with a factual guide that directly correlates to it.

Mary Pope Osborne is one of my favorite authors as she integrates historical information into a fictional setting with children. Her mode of transportation to great new worlds is thru books, which I just love! Ancient Egypt is one of my all time favorite topics, so this book was very enjoyable to me. I do not know why, but cats keep creeping into my reading this term, and this book is no different! The cat saves the day-- imagine that! This book sparks an interest for me to research topics such as 'The Book of the Dead' and burial rituals of the ancient Egyptians. I am somewhat familiar with mummification, so was kind of surprised they did not discuss this at some level. Perhaps she has a more informational book on this topic, as Mary Pope Osborne provides a number of supplemental books for many of her books. I especially appreciate ' The Magic Treehouse' series as it was the means that a wonderful teacher used to engage my son in reading for enjoyment.

I like this book because I like mummies and pyramids. ( )

I liked it because it was weird. It was a little scary because there was a dead person, and she looked weird. ( )