The Visitors: A Novel

At first I thought "this is an adventure story" Then it turned into a bit of a mystery. After a while, it started to feel like a 'gothic' novel. At the end, it was an interesting story with characters I cared about, a plot that mostly held together, but with an ending that felt a bit of a let-down. Still, I'm glad I read it. It helps that I've been to Luxor, visited the Valley of the Kings, stayed in the Winter Palace hotel (albeit in the modern cheaper rooms) and even Mena House (same story there).

Fascinating main character, a young girl with a distant (cruel) father, who finds herself connected loosely to the big characters who found King Tut's tomb. So we see that history through her eyes, where a powder puff and lipstick from a glamorous woman are more vital and important than the history being made. Yet the girl, Lucy, is a great observer and she matures and learns and understands as the book progresses. There are big story lines that hardly fit in the covers - the entire Ms. Mead-and-her-book story (Yankee, prude, ethical) who cares for Lucy and gives her the only adult love Lucy ever felt. - the Rose & Peter story - orphaned rich kids with amazingly big hearts despite a fearsome upbringing. - the horrible stepmother, lesbian painter lover & cold father story - which I skipped as much as possible because it was just full of non-pleasant people. I'm not sure this book can be reviewed as a book - it's more like a saga that either needed multiple printings in parts or else a good editor to leave some of these lively and well-written characters for another publication.

I highly enjoyed this book. It tells of a young girl and her companion who travel to Egypt . If I recall, she has a health issue in the beginning , so I’m not sure if the trip was to get her to a dry climate because of it ? I can’t remember as it’s been awhile since I’ve read this , so I’m going on memory alone. I know it was good writing and an interesting location, with some real life characters thrown in. Worth a second read.

The Visitors was the 1st book that I’ve read in a very long time that truly swept me away.The author has such a talent for writing that you feel like you are right there on the dahabiya listening to the Nile witnessing the discovery of the century. I felt the heat of the Egyptian desert, the cold rains of England....The bonds of friendship runs deep through this novel and you feel as though you are part of their story. Historical facts are accurate and characters are very likable. If you are looking for a good read and a thoughtful story, I highly recommend this book.P.S. I do agree with other reviews that the last 10 or so pages seems somewhat disconnected from the rest of the story. Felt a little rushed (didn't help that I didn't want the story to end) and a rapid tying up of lose ends. None the less it didn't take away from the hours of enjoyment I got from reading it. I almost never re-read a book but I assure you I will pick this one up again in the future and will fall in love with it all over again.

This is one of those books that you sink into because the characters and the writing are so comfortable, and you want to know what happens next. It's also a book that will teach anyone some history. The end of the British Raj in Egypt is the setting, and among the goals of the characters is the finding of King Tut's tomb. We see much of the action through the eyes of an eleven-year-old English girl who has been sent to friends of her father's in Egypt after the death of her mother. She tries to understand the grown ups, she finds a good friend of her own age, she picks up all sorts of knowledge about archaeology and the politics of archaeology. Anyone interested in Egypt, Egyptology, archaeology, and pre-teen curiosity, intelligence and growing pains should enjoy this book.

I enjoyed this novel on several levels. It is set in Egypt the 1920s during the time when King Tutankhamen's tomb was discovered. The story is told from the perspective of a young girl as she observed the adults who financed and conducted the excavations. We learned how the "loot" was divided, according to custom and Egyptian and international laws. The characters are real or fictional. Besides the logistics of searching for the tomb, and finding it, the novel was full of details about class and behavior of that time, both in Egypt and in England. Think about Agatha Christie's Murder on the Nile and picture David Suchet as Hercules Poirot. Then add Howard Carter and Lord Carnarvon and the crews and assorted politicians and journalists and other hangers on.

I appreciated how Beauman captured the feel of Egypt and how archaeology was conducted back in those days (I have been to Egypt so i can say she captured the scenery of Egypt very well). She did a very good job of capturing the intrigue and pure determination to find the treasures of Ancient Egypt, and of course, the callous, evil things people are willing to do to keep riches and history from the public eye. I agree with some of the other reviewers here, once Lucy is out of Egypt and back in England the rest of Lucy's life is dictated in a rush like Beauman was in a rush to get to the end or a certain page requirement. Overall though this was a very good book about a girl named Lucy and how she sees this turbulent time in history where not only is archaeology and what we knew about Ancient Egypt changing but of how the world was changing and the challenges that comes with negotiating through it.

As an archaeology student, this book absolutely thrilled me. As a fan of historic fiction, it thrilled me even more. The characterization was spot on accurate. It drew you in and the ending ... whew. This was a book that could have not ended any other way. It's rare that you find a book that centers around little known female historic figures that strives to be so incredibly accurate to their characterization. The fact that Sally managed to do what she did with so little to go off of was brilliant. I felt for these complex people. I hurt for them. I laughed with them. I really loved them in a way. And the setting. It came alive. This is hands down one of my favorite books. I recommend it to everyone I can.

This was the last of Sally Beauman's novels and I was the one I enjoyed the most - not least because the last thing I did before Covid hit was visit the Tutankhamun exhibition in London. Yet again she based part of the novel at Girton College Cambridge and yet again it is no great advert for either Cambridge or academia in general. Lucy's father and his wife her stepmother are very depressing characters. I liked the historical basis for the novel which covered the media hysteria about the tomb's discovery and in part the supposed curse. Fascinating though it is you disturb the dead at your peril. I had no idea that the castle used to film Downton Abbey was the home of the man who funded the exploration. Very interesting!!

When eleven year old Lucy Payne survives the typhoid that kills her American mother, her Cambridge academic father is unable, and unwilling, to cope with her. Taken by the redoubtable Miss Mack to Egypt to recuperate, this novel tells the story of Lucy’s life. We begin in Cairo in 1922 and travel through to the present, where an elderly Lucy is being questioned about her life for a documentary of the discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb.Much of this sumptuous novel is set in Egypt where Lucy makes friends with precocious Frances Winlock, the daughter of an American Egyptologist at a ballet class and, through her, Lady Rose Strathaven and her brother Peter. Over the years their lives intersect and, it is through her new friends, that Lucy meets Howard Carter and Lord Carnarvon. We follow Lucy back to Cambridge, where she finds Miss Nicola Dunshire – governess, housekeeper, enemy – installed in her mother’s place. Her desperate attempts to keep in touch with her friends and the way that Egypt, and the Valley of the Kings, draws her back are well realised. Obviously, the discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb is central to the plot; so many of the characters revolve around those events and the people involved.This novel is absolutely sumptuous. It is a saga, a love story, a tale of friendship, of longing, discovery and even murder. This is a book to curl up with and immerse yourself in. The author does a stunning job of showing you everything through Lucy’s eyes and I have no doubt that this is a novel that I will return to as I loved it so much.

I loved this book as I have been to Egypt several times and could picture all the scenes. I liked the moving back and forward between Lucy as a child and Lucy recalling what happened in old age. I was slightly disconcerted to discover that so many of the characters were real people. Obviously Howard Carter and Lord Carnarvon and the team who discovered Tutankhamun had to be in it, but I always wonder how these people would feel if they knew they were going to be 'fictionalised' - especially some of the minor characters like Frances and her mother - apparently Frances was a real child and she really did die of TB as an adult. Maybe just a foible of mine, to worry about that.

Lucy is sent to Egypt to recuperate from the typhoid fever which killed her mother. She is eleven years old and in the charge of the redoubtable American, Miss Mack. Life is exciting as she meets the people involved in discovering Tutankhamen's tomb - Howard Carter, Lord Caernarvon and his daughter and other Egyptologists. She makes friends with the daughter of one of them - a girl of a similar age to herself called Frances and through her she meets two more children - Rose and her brother Peter.The children are fascinated by the adults surrounding them and they attempt to spy on them to find out what is going on. Lucy is reliving her past as part of a documentary being made in the twenty first century. A large part of the book is taken up with her time in Egypt as the documentary is about the discovery of the tomb. She returns to the country later in life and never completely loses touch with the friends she made on that first stay in Egypt.Lucy also relives the time after she returned from Egypt to find Nicola Dunsire installed in her mother's place and Lucy isn't sure whether she likes her or hates her. I didn't like Nicola or her artist friend Clare - but it didn't spoil my enjoyment of the book which I think is well written.The book is many layered and I'm sure I shall pick up things I missed on reading it the first time. It is the sort of book which pulls you in until you feel as though you are a fly on the wall watching events through Lucy's eyes. I could almost see, feel and smell Egypt.I recommend this book to anyone who likes books they can really immerse themselves in and forget where they are what's going on in their own lives. I shall definitely be reading more books by this author.

I thoroughly enjoyed this novel, given that it is over 600 pages I was concerned it would become a nuisance however, I was completely wrong. The descriptions of Egypt in the 20s was breathtaking, I envied not being presence at this time. I adored Lucy throughout and found her life intriguing, there are some part filled with great sadness but many other moments filled with an array of emotions. I highly recommend this book, especially if you have an interest in the discovery of Tutankhamen.