Dead Men's Hearts (Gideon Oliver Mystery, #8)

by Aaron Elkins

Edgar Award-winning author: "A cunning plot, a remarkably appealing hero, some uproariously funny dialogue . . . a winning combination." -Booklist

An ancient skeleton tossed in a garbage dump is the first conundrum to rattle Gideon Oliver when he arrives in Egypt. There to appear in a documentary film, he expects an undemanding week of movie star treatment and a luxurious cruise up the Nile with his wife, Julie. But when Gideon discovers a tantalizing secret in the discarded bones-and violence claims a famous Egyptologist's life-he is thrust into a spotlight of a different kind. Plying his calipers as the world's foremost forensic anthropologist, Gideon's investigation of the goings-on leads him through the back alleys and bazaars of Cairo and deep into the millennia-old tombs of the Valley of the Kings.

As the puzzle is painstakingly pieced together, Gideon will find that the identifying traits of a cunning killer are the same now as they were in the time of the pyramids: greed without guilt, lies without conscience . . . and murder without remorse.

Dead Men's Hearts is the 8th book in the Gideon Oliver Mysteries, but you may enjoy reading the series in any order.

• ISBN10: 0892964669
• ISBN13: 9780892964666
• Publish Date: 1 May 1994
• Publish Status: Out of Print
• Out of Print: 2 July 2014
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: Mysterious Press
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 227
• Language: English

Reviews

[Mystereity Reviews]

As I've said before, this series seems to be hit or miss and this one was in the miss category.

Gideon is in Egypt, having been strong-armed into narrating a documentary about the history of Horizon House, a museum and archaeology facility in Luxor, steps from the Sphinx. This was an audaciously multi faceted plot; the suspicious death of the man in charge of the facility, the theft of ancient artifacts, and a skeleton of a modern day man found labeled as an ancient skeleton. All of this points to an inside job, and Gideon has to work out who. The plot was well done, the scenery beautiful (it's so easy to picture the locations with all the rich descriptions) but it just didn't grab me the way other books in this series have. It was good, but not GOOD. 3 1/2 stars