When I was a young teen King Tutankhamun's treasures sailed across the ocean to begin a three year long tour of America. I'm not sure if it was all the news coverage or Steve Martin that made me jump on that bandwagon along with the rest of the country, but the fascination stuck. So even though I didn't get to see the stuff in person, I did go through a phase of reading all about the boy king. So The Visitors is a bit of a blast from the past, except Beauman took a different spin on Tut and told a story of the discovery.
The story begins strong, young Lucy is sent off to recover from a bout with typhoid in the warmer climate of Egypt. Here she meets up with the daughter of an archaeologist and the two begin spying on the dig site. In this part of the book readers learn about the Valley of the Kings, the funding, the relationships between Howard Carter, the Earl of Carnarvon, Herbert Winlock, Albert Lythgoe and others who were innermost in the discovery of Tut's tomb. It's after the actual discovery that the book takes a detour and begins delving into Lucy's later life and secondary players who surround her, and thus the story is dragged through the mud.
This was an okay historical. Could have been better if the author hadn't become distracted.
Sounds interesting to me since I never really got into that in the beginning. It's something different than I usually read - thanks for the rec!
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