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THE BOOK OF THE DEAD is the climactic conclusion to what is loosely referred to as the Pendergast Trilogy. As such, you would expect to have to have read the previous two works in order to have any idea of what is going on. No doubt much more could be gleaned from the novel if you are an avid follower, but it can also be said that Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child succeed in providing a book that does not completely leave first-time readers in the dark. From the get go, they weave in story elements and background enough to give you some idea of what it is that has gone before. As a stand-alone piece, THE BOOK OF THE DEAD is still a heck of a thrilling ride.
The New York Museum of Natural History is the backdrop for the tale, and in page one things already begin to go incredibly wrong. A delivery arrives via bike messenger. Tattered and leaking a mysterious powder, the Museum is shut down in a post-9/11 potential bio-terror panic scenario. The powder in question, however, is not nearly so dangerous, yet it is extremely troublesome. Previously, the Museum's diamond collection had been stolen, and the dust delivered in the box is the remains of that priceless exhibit. Now the question is who would steal something so valuable only to destroy it? And how can the Museum deflect the media scrutiny to come?
The answer to the second question is simple: locate and reopen the Tomb of Senef exhibit. Originally opened 70 years previously, the exhibit was mysteriously shut after a series of grisly murders began to plague the Museum. Giving the old Egyptian presentation a state-of-the-art overhaul seems to be a wonderful idea until the murders begin again. As if this weren't bad enough, FBI Agent Aloysius Pendergast and his maniacal brother, Diogenes, are involved in a chess match that yields some startling results in the book's final pages.
THE BOOK OF THE DEAD is crafted much like a rope. Not just one simple thread, the novel takes the stories of several characters and winds them tightly around each other to form one strong and compelling story. With so many characters floating around, it would become a tangled mess in the hands of less capable authors. Preston and Child have a clear idea of their direction for the individual arcs and their place in the storyline as a whole, and thus are able to snag readers as soon as the cover is cracked. They propel the story forward with great skill and without ever leaving readers with a shred of disinterest or boredom. This is not merely quality writing, this is quality storytelling.
--- Reviewed by Stephen Hubbard
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