Elizabeth
Peters is the author of twenty-five acclaimed mysteries, including Naked
Once More, The Last Camel Died at Noon, The Snake, the Crocodile and the
Dog, and Night Train to Memphis. She has also written twenty-five novels
of suspence under the New York Times bestselling pseudonym Barbara Michaels.
Ms Peters, whose novels are often set against historical backdrops, earned
a Ph.D. in Egyptology at the Univercity of Chicago. She is the mother of
two and the grandmother of four. In 1990 she was awarded an honorary Doctor
of Humane Letters by Hood Collage. She lives in Frederick, Maryland, with
six cats and two dogs.
(Bookcover of 'Night Train to Memphis', Warner Books, 1995)
I stumbled across my first Elizabeth Peters book on one of my trips through Europe some years ago. It was in Seville in Spain and I found it in a small bookshop offering also a variety of second hand English books. The title of the book was "The Curse Of The Pharaohs" and the description on the back seemed to promise just the story I was looking for: a mystery, crawling through tombs, a murder, not really caused by a curse and this Amelia Peabody, a clever lady detective.
The book held its promise and was a funny distracion from the sights of the rest of Spain. But somehow, back in Austria, it just vanished in one of my many bookshelves. Only three years ago I read it again in the silence of my home. After smiling, laughing and fearing along with Amelia a second time and this time much more "closely", I decided to get another book of that series (I only discoverd then the list at the beginning of the book that indicated that it was indeed a part of a series!). In Austrian bookshops there is no big selection of English books (and ordering them took a lifetime then..) but I was lucky to find one by Elizabeth Peters which seemed to be the newest of the Amelia series, "The Hippopotamus Pool". That was the beginning of my addiction. When I discovered that there was a second series "starring" Vicky Bliss, working at a museum in Munich for that wonderful Bavarian director Hr. Schmidt, I've found my favourite.
You may ask why I took the trouble to get Elizabeth Peters' books in English when there sure are translations in German. There are, and I've tried. I always try to find the books I want to read in our town library first before buying them (why?..). I really found the German version of "The Curse Of The Pharaohs" named "Der Fluch des Pharaonengrabes" and also "Der Mumienschrein" (The Mummy Case) and they were funny, too. But believe me, there *is* a difference. There is no way translating all nuances of the genuine Peters style. So I thank again my parents for sending me to school where I had the pleasure (more or less but the result counts) to recieve 8 years of English training. Being a bookworm (nearly) all my life I soon discovered that reading books in English was fun and had also some training effect (unfortunately it didn't work with french books). Of course I only read books originally written in English. Till now I haven't read the English translation of one of Goethes books an English speaking friend presented to me once.
Only last month I read the first of Peters' books written under the name of Barbara Michaels and I liked it, too. But my favourites will always be Vicky Bliss and Amelia Peabody!
Greatings to all the other Elizabeth Peters fans around the world, may she write a lot more of her wonderful books!
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