Yay, a new author that was brilliant :) Okay, so he's apparently been around for a while, and this is his third book, but new to me. And utterly gripping. Also, the whole can't put it down thing is not helped by the fact that there are no chapters! I didn't realise this until part way through when I realised I should go do something else and decided to follow my usual expedient of forcing myself to stop reading by putting in my bookmark at the start of the next chapter. On some books, this doesn't work anyway, but it certainly wouldn't have worked here!
I'm not sure where I stand on not chaptering. I've tried it myself, but the book was tremendously complicated and I had to colour code it to make it comprehensible to myself, so I certainly hope no one decides to publish it posthumously! That said, it worked with this book, and natural breaks in the text were provided by scene shifts.
I liked the characters. I liked them a lot, in fact. Especially Flin, obsessed Egyptologist trying to come to terms with his past and hunting down a lost oasis. Nice bit of magical/booby trap stuff in there at the end, and plenty of action. Really enjoyed it, and I've got another of Paul Sussman's books out already. I imagine these are going to be books that end up on my bookcase (although I am having major running out space issues at the moment! Might need to find somewhere to put another bookcase, though where on earth I could fit one is another matter altogether...).
I guess it's your standard archaeological thriller, which is definitely a legitimate category of books. It has to be, there's loads of them! And it makes a nice change from Atlantis books (although as long as they're well written, I have no problem with a plethora of Atlantis books, as my bookshelves will bear witness... I believe I have three with Atlantis in the title).
At any rate, it's well written and I struggled to put it down. Well worth keeping an eye out for it!
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