This book is not really about Ancient Egypt. It is, as its title suggests, a book about the discovery of Egypt by modern Europeans and research on the civilization through the 1980s. In a lot of ways it reminds me of a National Geographic issue which isn't bad it just isn't highly technical or academic but geared toward a general audience. If it is judged with this audience in mind, it rates as an excellent book. For anyone more serious, it may be amusing and interesting and certainly a nice change in that it attempts to discuss fairly recent research.