You have to read a book subtitled "Science, Obsession, and the Everlasting Dead". At least I did--sometime over a year ago, now. My copy has since been loaned to dear friends Richard Rogala and Edel Toner-Rogala, and is about to become the next offering from me to my brother-in-law, Peder, in our unofficial book club otherwise known as exchanging Xmas gifts. It isn't a book I want to part with, however, without first registering my approval. Without getting back "into it" I can best convey the memory--despite the intervening months--as follows: imagine what mummy enthusiasts argue about; imagine them being quirky, individual and passionate; and imagine the stories that mummies have to tell. The
Mummy Congress interweaves three kinds of stories. Those of the mummies, those of the scientists who study them, and that of the author as she is drawn into the extraordinary relationship between those two groups, almost--at first--against her better judgement. At least that is how I remember it, at the distance of over a year since I turned the last page.
