Napoleon’s Pyramids

Napoleon’s Pyramids
William Dietrich
HarperCollins
ISBN: 978-0-06-084832-3
Historical Fiction, Thriller
Reviewed by Shannon Frost

Ethan Gage’s main ambition in life is to be unambitious. Instead of using his position as a low level Freemason and former apprentice to Benjamin Franklin to open doors to a successful career, the American living in post-revolutionary France is far more content to skate through life surviving off his winnings at the card tables. On a night where every hand he’s dealt leads to wins, Ethan feels he’s having the luckiest night of his life, until he adds a mysterious medallion to his pile of winnings. Forced to flee Paris after being framed for murder and being hunted for his medallion, Ethan seeks sanctuary under a striving young general looking to make his own mark on the world, Napoleon Bonaparte, and joins his military expedition to Egypt. Now the only thing Ethan has to do to survive, is unravel the mysteries of the ancients that have lain hidden for thousands of years.
Pulitzer Prize winning journalist William Dietrich has once again proven his merit as a fiction author in the fast paced novel, Napoleon’s Pyramids. Brimming with historical fact, Egyptian lore, religious philosophy and Indiana Jones-esque action, from the first page to the last, the reader is riveted to each exciting twist and fascinating theory. The often humorous protagonist, Ethan Gage, has the spirit of a hero, but the mind of an opportunist, and this makes him that much more human. Late eighteenth century France and Egypt unfold with brilliant clarity, and the famed figures from the past that are presented expressing their ideals and knowledge work to further bring life to the story. The meticulous research that went into the novel is obvious, and it is in these deftly written details ranging from French military tactics to the intriguing mathematical theories surrounding the Pyramids that make this work something to be enjoyed more than once and shared with anyone who takes pleasure in a thrilling adventure with a thought provoking plot.