Heart of the Nile

In Thomas’s superlative 14th mystery featuring Victorian inquiry agents Cyrus Barker and Thomas Llewelyn (after 2022’s Fierce Poison), grammar school teacher Phillip Addison has volunteered to work at night to help the British Museum catalog its enormous collection of Egyptian mummies. In the process, Addison hopes to further his own research and devise a formula to determine a mummy’s original weight. But when he looks at a female mummy that has languished for years unexamined, he discovers it’s surprisingly heavy—and that its chest contains a giant heart-shaped ruby. Addison hurries to inform his superior, Clive Hennings, of the treasure, but disappears after doing so. Addison’s wife asks Barker and Llewelyn to find him, a task complicated when Hennings shares that the mummy containing the jewel may be Cleopatra herself. The missing person case becomes a homicide inquiry when someone linked to the mummy is found floating in the Thames, the victim of a fatal stabbing. The author does a terrific job playing a variation on the classic brilliant sleuth and capable sidekick duo. Thomas is on a roll. Agent: Maria Carvainis, Maria Carvainis Agency. (Apr.)