Lion in the Valley (Amelia Peabody Book 4)

Lion in the Valley is the fourth novel in a series of historical mystery novels, written by Elizabeth Peters and featuring fictional sleuth and archaeologist Amelia Peabody. Plot summary[edit]. The Emersons return to Egypt in to excavate at Dahshoor - finally, some real pyramids for Amelia!.
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Download your e-book s from your bookshelf. E-book Mass Market PB. Specialty Booksellers Interest-specific online venues will often provide a book buying opportunity. International Customers If you are located outside the U. About Product Details The season promises to be an exceptional one for Amelia Peabody, her dashing Egyptologist husband Emerson, and their wild and precocious eight-year-old son Ramses.

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Lion in the Valley (Amelia Peabody, book 4) by Elizabeth Peters

The gripping new psychological thriller from the bestselling author of In a Cottage in a Wood by Cass Green. A Fatal Mistake by Faith Martin. Finding Lucy by Diana Finley.


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A gripping mystery perfect for all crime fiction readers by Faith Martin. A gripping crime mystery full of twists and turns! In looking for a keeper for Ramses , they find a demoralized Englishman named Donald Fraser. Donald has troubled family relationships and a hashish habit, both of which Amelia means to reform. Enid Debenham, a young lady whose behavior scandalizes Cairo society, also takes a hand when Amelia takes her under her wing.

Meanwhile, the Master Criminal reappears personally, taking an interest not only in illegally obtained antiquities but in the person of Amelia herself. The story is key in the series because it is the first time the reader learns the pseudonym of the Master Criminal: It is the name of a number of Pharaohs, and is tied to Set or Seth, the Egyptian god of the desert. Sethos interacts in a number of ways, including offering gifts and returning the communion set stolen from Mazghuna the previous year.

Sethos also appears in a number of guises, only one of which Amelia sees through.

Lion in the Valley An Amelia Peabody Novel of Suspense Amelia Peabody Series

She does, however, assume a number of others are either Sethos or in his gang, almost always incorrectly. The Emersons' son, Ramses is also further developed in this outing, as he is now, at eight years of age, infuriatingly clever and precocious, much to the chagrin and annoyance of his mother.

There is a particularly funny scene in which Ramses requests his parents provide him information on the "feelings" he is having about the opposite sex. Amelia deserts Emerson to have this discussion with their son, and the entire scene left me laughing so hard I had tears running down my cheeks! The mystery in this book is as entertaining as always, as are the supporting characters Peters introduces in this outing. I enjoyed this book just as much as I have the preceding ones, and cannot wait for the next installment. I cannot recommend this series highly enough! These books are fabulous if you like wonderfully multi-facted, quirky characters, lighting-fast, witty dialogue and over-the-top outlandish but hugely funny plots.

Apr 16, April rated it it was amazing Shelves: I'm not quite finished with the book yet but wanted to mention this while it was in my head You know what the great part of this is? There isn't a single graphic sexual comment, no sexual language, no crazy euphamisms and absolutely no sex scenes. So how do I know there is a great deal of sex going on here? Well, this author has talent. She has the art of 'hint, hint, nudge, nudge' down pat. She explicity explains, without actual details, I'm not quite finished with the book yet but wanted to mention this while it was in my head She explicity explains, without actual details, that Emerson and Peabody have a wonderful, loving, romantic and sexually fulfilling relationship.

It is clean, safe, family friendly - but so darned romantic and loving that I love it to tiny little pieces! Ok, finished and what can I say? I loved it just as much as the first three. Now I have to hope that her publishers do the same and bundle the rest for sale in nice big bunches like this. If you like mystery, cozies, a bit of history and archeology and humor and family and love If not, rediscover them for the first time. Oct 31, Celia rated it really liked it Shelves: I never talk in my sleep. It is a sign of mental instability.

What was I saying? Amelia's capture and rescue was quite thrilling, and I enjoyed her musings about the Master Criminal being like the pharoahs, a lion in a valley of goats. About to commence the carnage, one assumes. I am even enjoying Ramses now, who at first I found rather insufferable, but an insufferable "You were talking in your sleep last night, Amelia.

I am even enjoying Ramses now, who at first I found rather insufferable, but an insufferable character is much more endearing when it is apparent that his own parents find him rather insufferable or at least, Amelia does. It makes me wonder whether Ramses is one of those characters that authors speak of that emerge in their mind, and then rampage through their stories doing whatever they like. Sep 17, ShoSho rated it liked it Shelves: The narrator wasn't bad but her Emerson voice was awful and she had long pauses.


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As for the plot, there was almost no plot! The end was funny and unexpected. May 28, Terran rated it it was ok. I read the first few Amelia Peabody books on an indirect recommendation. I've read relatively few genre mysteries, aside from some Sherlock Holmes, a few Agatha Christies, and a couple of Tony Hillermans.

So I was interested to learn a bit more about this field.

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They were fun, and very much on the light end of the scale. The Egyptology was definitely fasci I read the first few Amelia Peabody books on an indirect recommendation. The Egyptology was definitely fascinating, and I'll give them that they had a better justification for the mysteries than some cozy mystery authors come up with. My problem is that the characters were radically, drastically implausible. Especially "Ramses", the "precocious" six- or seven-year-old child of the protagonists. He goes beyond precocious to the point of utterly shattering my suspension of disbelief every time he opens his mouth.

He makes Ender look like a retiring and somewhat inept prepubescent, going through petty growing pains.

Lion in the Valley

The other characters are also overblown caricatures, but they are at least occasionally fun to read and don't take themselves too seriously. I get the impression that Peters wrote the first book with amusingly exaggerated characters but that when the series took off, she felt a need to successively exaggerate the characters and scenarios with every book, until by the fourth book, it's difficult to read them. On the flip side, she does poke fun at a number of mystery genre tropes. I love Amelia's offhand comment that she doesn't read mysteries because the characters are always solving things with incredible leaps of illogic.

And the Master Criminal, when he is revealed at the end of the fourth book, is such an absurd piece of work that he has to be a spoof on Evil Villain tropes. At least, I choose to believe so and laugh, rather than gag when I read him. I get the sense that there's more satire of the genre going on here than I'm entirely catching -- that if I'd read more in the genre, I could appreciate these better. On the whole, they were fun light reads, but I don't feel compelled to read further in the series.

It's a bit disappointing, really -- the world of the 19th century Egyptology craze is fascinating, and it would be neat to read really well developed mysteries in that era. As it is, I kept wishing that the characters would take their petty mysteries and get out of the way, to let the rest of us appreciate the surroundings.

May 29, Alana rated it really liked it Shelves: Perhaps my favorite Amelia Peabody Emerson mystery yet! Elizabeth Peters isn't exactly a brilliant mystery novelist as far as the mystery part is concerned, but she does, indeed, craft a fun tale -- and she's created two very charming lead characters whose banter more than makes up for any deficiencies as far as the mystery is concerned. Thankfully any issues which cropped up in the past few novels and proved to be irritating aka Ramses and his speech defect have been firmly dealt with and rea Perhaps my favorite Amelia Peabody Emerson mystery yet!

Thankfully any issues which cropped up in the past few novels and proved to be irritating aka Ramses and his speech defect have been firmly dealt with and reasonably worked around. True, things are a bit formulaic and yes, there are several things that the reader just needs to accept and roll with, but hey, I felt more entertained by this book than I have by the previous two installments and this firmly planted me in the pro-Peters camp so that I know I'll keep reading the series, so clearly the book is a very welcome chapter in the lives of Amelia Peabody and Radcliffe Emerson.

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They acquired this coveted site after events from the previous novel saw them all imprisoned in the black pyramid at Dahshoor and young Ramses may or may not have helped the Director of Antiquities to a rich and exciting find. Even with such glorious pyramids, though, one could not think that Amelia Peabody Emerson would be so content as to ignore the danger from the Master Criminal, that fiend who runs a black-market antiquities ring. Those readers who were growing a bit annoyed at the constant speculation on such a character will be quite pleased with this novel, where considerable progress is made towards unmasking the devil, or at least learning more about his her?

The Emersons have a talent for "adopting" down-on-their-luck Englishmen a role filled just as often by Englishwomen, though and this holds true here. They run across a young man named Nemo or such is the name he selects from himself who is obviously a well-bred Englishman or Scot even if he is dirty, dressed as an Arab, and has clearly been smoking opium. After Nemo saves Ramses from potentially being abducted, Emerson insists that they take in this stray and assigns him the role of Ramses-caretaker no one is much surprised that this post is never filled by one person for more than one book.

Not to be outdone, Peabody has her own idea as to who should be taken under her wing this trip when she learns the identity of a young lady named Miss Enid Debenham, an heiress seen in the company of the scheming Kalenischeff. Of course, when Kalenischeff is found dead in her room and Miss Debenham is nowhere to be found, there is some question as to whether or not the lady can look after herself. Naturally, of course, there's plenty of romantic backstory to entangle "Nemo" and Enid and that all plays a role as the Emersons try to determine who killed Kalenischeff, who is behind the antiquities smuggling ring, and who seems to be sending Amelia little tokens of love Of primary importance to me in this particular volume was the fact that Ramses has mostly outgrown any speech defects that rendered his soliloquies quite irritating.

Now the boy is merely tiresome, but his parents seem to share the same opinion as this reader and so they are frequently cutting the boy off The somewhat harder to swallow storyline involves the identity of the master criminal and his true passions Be that as it may, at least we do get to interact with this genius of crime and we get to see Emerson fume and fuss with jealousy as Amelia bumbles on, oblivious until it's all immediately in her face or lap. Peters seems to have allowed herself to be a touch more romance-y in each novel, though it's not like there's anything graphic. Perhaps it's simply that she's a little freer with the jokes on this topic, as with a particularly funny exchange when Miss Debenham comments that she heard such strange noises in the desert during the night It's rather quite cute to see Peters add in those small touches while, thankfully, refraining from totally veering into romance novel territory.

As passionate as Peabody and Emerson might be, I rather prefer the pan off into the sunset technique as far as they're concerned. Since I was a little disappointed with The Mummy Case , I was all the more pleased to see that Peters had produced quite a pleasant addition to her series with Lion in the Valley. By this point, most readers will have decided if they're jumping ship on the series or sticking it out and, unsurprisingly, I shall continue to read. The good thing, though, is the fact that these don't particularly require the reader to devour them with great speed, so I feel like I can stretch out my enjoyment to savor these books from this point on, dipping into my stash whenever a rainy day permits.

May 06, Sarah Hough rated it liked it Shelves: I've reached the point with Amelia as an unreliable narrator that I find myself wanting to skip ahead to the future books with different narrators just to get a sense of how she's really perceived by all of the ancillary characters who she believes are besotted by her kindness, intelligence and generosity. I'm also past done with clever asides about her boisterous sexual escapades.

Was also very disappointed by the absence of any archaeology in this book, esp. Maybe those stories are in Book 5? The plot is ridiculous these are meant mostly as a parody of adventure novels rather than serious mysteries but I enjoy the Emerson family very much. I look forward to watching Rameses' exploits as he grows up.

I like Amelia's wary yet resigned attitude towards her implausibly precocious, accident-prone son. Two stars off for the annoying Ramses. Sep 03, Kate rated it really liked it. I knew the reader was important, but sheesh!

Lion In the Valley

Finishing it read by Barbara Rosenblat was like finding a friend recovered from an obsession with an MLM company, ready to be herself again. On to The Deeds of the Disturber!


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    4. Nov 06, Rebekah Giese Witherspoon rated it it was amazing. My favorite book so far in the Amelia Peabody series. The mystery is interesting and is woven throughout the book. The quirky characters are just as hilarious and engaging as ever. I'm hooked on this series Nov 27, Shiloah rated it really liked it Shelves: I can always count on cute themes, some cheesy romance, and a somewhat violent climax of men fighting each other. This is the first book in the series of which I "listened to some but not all where The Master Criminal's nomdeplume or for the purists who will insist this means "pen name" alias is revealed If you've read any of my other reviews on this series of books you know that I believe them to be very well written, but just don't enjoy them in some ways, primarily this i This is the first book in the series of which I "listened to some but not all where The Master Criminal's nomdeplume or for the purists who will insist this means "pen name" alias is revealed If you've read any of my other reviews on this series of books you know that I believe them to be very well written, but just don't enjoy them in some ways, primarily this is due to the fact that I somewhat dislike the protagonist Amelia Peabody.

    The attitude that the author writes for her about the "Master Criminal" character is probably one of the reasons. Amelia carries on a continuing flirtation with "the Master Criminal" throughout much of this series I can't help but identify with her husband, and would probably have been slightly more, insistent that she make up her mind as to her stance on criminality and monogamy.

    Again I recognize that some will like this plot point and enjoy the books more because of it So, antique thefts and secrets revealed if you like this series this is an important entry. It is well written as are the others and as with the others I listened to I finished it and it is a well done mystery that hangs together. The 3 star rating reflects my lack of enjoyment here, not technically insufficiency. Some of you will love this book. This is the second Amelia Peabody I have read, and it will be my last.