Crocodile on the Sandbank

Elizabeth Peters (also Barbara Michaels) is one of my favorite mystery writers, although I must confess I haven't liked the latest books in her Amelia Peabody series. For no other reason than I don't care for the Ramses/Nefret dynamic.

But the earlier Elizabeth Peters, and Barbara Michaels, are pretty good. (Peters, aka Barbara Mertz, her real name, in which she actually is an Egyptologist), is in her 70s now, and I think every writer declines in their 70s, especially when they write a novel a year...

But that may seem like I'm dissing Elizabeth Peters, and I'm not, for, as I said, I love her early stuff. In particular, Crocodile on the Sandbank, published in 1975, which introduced the world to Amelia Peabody - now Peters' most popular character and the one whom she writes most of her books about.

It starts out similar to Agatha Christie's The Man in the Brown Suit (written in the 1920s) about a woman who is the daughter of an archaeologist, father dies, and she goes off on adventures. (After the first chapter, of course the stories diverge. On a couple of occasions, Peters pays homage to Christie, which is kind of fun.) In Amelia Peabody's case, she comes into a fortune which enables her to travel to Egypt, where she meets Radcliffe Emerson. They spar,they spat, they fall in love. And the mummy walks.

Highly recommended.