By James Patterson Copyright 2009
It was apparently the intention of the author of this book to write a historical novel. However, he failed and his book seems to be mostly a work of fiction, or even worse, a fraud or hoax. The author claims King Tut was murdered by a conspiracy of his wife and his top advisor and general. His evidence is supposedly the pictures on the wall of King Tut's tomb. But the information presented in this book is unlikely to convince anyone of that fact.
This short book contains over 100 short chapters. The chapters alternate between scenes from ancient Egypt, the early 20th century, and the present day. The ancient Egypt scenes include biographical dramas involving King Tut's ancestors and King Tut's own life and death. Even for a historical novel the author takes incredible liberties with supposed historical facts. Most of his assumptions about the life of King Tut appear to be pure speculation, and other assumptions seem based on minor scraps of historical evidence or theory.
The book's scenes set in the early 20th century involve the archaeologist Howard Carter who discovered King Tut's tomb in the 1920's. The biographical dramas focusing on Howard Carter seem to be based on more reliable sources, but they still seem over dramatized.
The scenes set in the present day feature the author discussing the book with his publisher and his wife.
The chapters featuring King Tut are the worst. The author makes the characters seem like they are from a cheap romance novel. There can't possibly be any historical evidence to support most of the author's portrayal of King Tut. Historical evidence doesn't exist about King Tut's thoughts and feeling about the people in his life. So when the author presents scenes rich with details about the feelings and thoughts of King Tut and his associates, he is clearly just making it up. In addition, he attempts to write in the style of Shakespeare and make the characters seem out of Macbeth. The author is clearly attempting to make the scenes intriguing and sophisticated, but instead they just seem fake.
The chapters featuring Howard Carter the archaeologist are marginally better, but not by much. Again the author is clearly over dramatizing events and making stuff up.
Ultimately, this book is rubbish and suitable for burning. It is historical make-believe. The author should be ashamed of himself. But if he had any conscience or sense of shame, he would never have attempted to get this piece of rubbish published.
Sunday, June 19, 2011
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