The Last Camel Died at Noon (Amelia Peabody Series #6) Book

Let me tell you a bit about that 19th Century fictional feminist Amelia Peabody. "…I always try to become friendly with the women, in hope of instructing them in the rights and privileges to which their sex is morally entitled." She spins her recollections in the first person with an almost encyclopedic knowledge of Egyptology and archeology.

And let Peabody tell you about her brilliant and pretentious husband. "Professor Radcliffe Emerson, F.R.S., F.B.A., LL.D. (Edinburgh), D.C.L. (Oxford), Member of the American Philosophical Society, et cetera, preeminent Egyptologist of this or any other era, was frequently to be encountered in unusual, not to say peculiar, surroundings. Will I ever forget that magical moment when I entered a tomb in the desolate cliffs bordering the Nile and found him delirious with fever, in desperate need of attentions he was helpless to resist? The bond forged between us by my expert nursing was strengthened by the dangers we subsequently shared; and in due course, Reader, I married him. Since that momentous day we had excavated in every major site in Egypt and written extensively on our discoveries. Modesty prevents me from claiming too large a share of the scholarly reputation we had earned, but Emerson would have been the first to proclaim that we were a partnership, in archaeology as in marriage."

Emerson, also known as "The Father of Curses," their son, Ramses, and a new cast of characters are off up the Nile to Nubia. The plot involves both an old acquaintance who was last heard from fourteen years previously, and the opportunity to look at some ancient sites. Treasure was not the objective as Ramses explains: "The goal of proper excavation…is not treasure but knowledge. Any scrap of material, no matter how insignificant, may supply an essential clue to our understanding of the past. Our primary purpose here is to establish the original plan, and, if possible, the relative chronology…"

Barbara Mertz got her degree in Egyptology from the University of Chicago about the time I was born. She seems to have had a fascination for mysteries and crime and her books (20) about Amelia Peabody were written with the pen-name Elizabeth Peters. Each book (in order) is intended to represent one yearly expedition in search of knowledge of antiquities. They begin in the last two decades of the 19th Century. There is plenty of opportunity for "Peters" to share her knowledge of the various Egyptian dynasties; their customs; their gods; their dress; their cosmetics; their eating habits; their social organization; etc. For the most part, this enhances her stories.

There was more thriller than mystery to this novel and, for me, that was just fine. I enjoy these journeys into antiquity but once every decade or so is enough to satisfy. 3.5*