Amelia Peabody series

Amelia Peabody Series

First edition cover for Crocodile on the Sandbank (1975), book 1 of the series
Author	Elizabeth Peters
Country	United States
Language	English
Genre	Historical mystery, Thriller, Satire, Comedy
Publisher	Morrow/HarperCollins (current)
Published	1975–2010, 2017
Media type	Print (hardback and paperback), audiobook
No. of books	20 (List of books)

The Amelia Peabody series is a series of nineteen historical mystery novels and one non-fiction companion volume written by Egyptologist Barbara Mertz (1927-2013) under the pen name Elizabeth Peters. The series is centered on the adventures of the unconventional female Egyptologist Amelia Peabody Emerson, for whom the series is named, and an ever-increasing number of family, friends, allies, and characters both fictional and based on historical figures. The novels blend mystery and romance with a wryly comic tone, and at times also parody Victorian-era adventure novels such as those written by H. Rider Haggard. The series was published between 1975 and 2010, with a final posthumous installment set for publication in 2017.

Amelia Peabody is introduced in the series' first novel, Crocodile on the Sandbank as a confirmed spinster, suffragist, and scholar, living in England in 1884. She inherits a fortune from her father and leaves England to see the world, with the side benefit of escaping various suitors and family members who were neither aware that she would be the sole beneficiary of her father's estate nor that he had amassed a small fortune over the course of his lifetime.

In Rome, Amelia meets Evelyn Barton-Forbes, a young Englishwoman of social standing who has run off with (and subsequently been abandoned by) her Italian lover, and the two make their way to Egypt. There they meet the Emerson brothers, Egyptologist Radcliffe and his philologist brother Walter. Over the course of the first book the couples pair up: Amelia marries Radcliffe (referred to throughout the series by his last name "Emerson"), and Evelyn marries Walter.

Following the birth of their son Ramses (né Walter) Emerson ("as swarthy as an Egyptian and as arrogant as a Pharaoh"), the Emersons initially settle in Kent, from where Emerson commutes to a job lecturing in Egyptology at university in London. Despite Amelia's suggestions that he resume seasonal digs in Egypt, Emerson insists on staying in England with his family while Ramses is too young to travel.

Peabody and Emerson return to Egypt at least once without Ramses (The Curse of the Pharaohs) in 1892 before deciding to bring him along on their annual digs (The Mummy Case), beginning in the 1894-95 season. Amelia's desire to explore pyramids is countered by Emerson's refusal to be diplomatic with the Egyptian Service d'Antiquites, resulting in the loss of their firman (permit) to excavate at one of the major pyramid fields, and instead being awarded Mazghuna, a minor pyramid field southwest of Cairo.