The Dead Sea Cipher

By Elizabeth Peters

It was the start of a grand adventure in a land of antiquity, a rare opportunity to visit biblical places shrouded in mystery. But in a Jerusalem hotel room a world away from everything she knows, Dinah van der Lyn hears angry voices through the wall, followed by a crash and a brief cry in English...for help! The brutal shattering of an evening's stillness becomes a prelude to terror. Without warning, Dinah has been unwittingly pulled into something unholy transpiring in a sacred city, and she must find answers hidden in the shadows. And she must trust an enigmatic stranger as she races through ancient, twisting streets teeming with secrets and peril, a man who may be leading her to safety...or to her doom.

• Language: English
• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Release date: Oct 13, 2009
• ISBN: 9780061840890

Elizabeth Peters

Elizabeth Peters earned her Ph.D. in Egyptology from the University of Chicago’s famed Oriental Institute. During her fifty-year career, she wrote more than seventy novels and three nonfiction books on Egypt. She received numerous writing awards and, in 2012, was given the first Amelia Peabody Award, created in her honor. She died in 2013, leaving a partially completed manuscript of The Painted Queen.

Reviews for The Dead Sea Cipher

[JudithSimmons · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Loved it!

[bookwoman247 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

When Dinah Van der Lyn travels to the Holy Land she finds herself thrust into the middle of an international plot involving the possible discovery of an ancient scroll that, if brought to light, would likely turn the Christian world on end. Danger and intrigue follow her through the Middle East, as do two handsome young men. Which, if either, should she trust?I think I could describe this fairly accurately and simply as a dated Da Vinci Code light, (yes, it is possible to find a lighter work than Dan Brown's), set in the Middle East, with an ingenue protagonist.I enjoyed the book well enough, but had to overlook its flaws...the dated feeling, (it was written in 1970), the overdone plot, and worst of all, an ending that I felt was weak, as if the author was writing her way out of a box.The plot was rapidly paced, though, and I found the main idea and setting interesting. It kept me entertained.

[aharey · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Dinah goes to Israel as a way to help her father see the world. She ends up hearing a fatal fight, which sets intrigue in motion. She is followed and two men fight to gain her trust. Will she choose the right one?