Customer Reviews

Whispers In The Sand

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Barbara Erskine re-explores her favorite themes of obsession, romance, and the supernatural in this 500+-page novel told against the exotic backdrop of the lush Nile banks and the fascinating monuments of Egypt's ancient kings.

In 1866, famous artist Louisa Shelley, newly widowed cruises down from Luxor to Ashram. She recounts her travel adventures through her paintings/sketches and in her diary. In particular she revels in the telling of a newfound love and his gift of an ancient scent bottle.

Now in modern times, Louisa's great-great-granddaughter, Anna, at odds with her own life, returns to the scene of her ancestor's adventure, bringing the diary and the scent bottle back to Egypt where their return initiates a chain of events which threaten Anna's very life. Feelings of greed, obsession,and jealousy stir amongst the passengers on-board Anna's cruise, but the main force unleashed whirls from the hub of the scent bottle, the contents of which is protected by two malevolent priests who drain the lifeforce of all those who come within the bottle's sphere of influence.

This particular foray into the supernatural is written very much in the more hurried style Ms Erskine employs in "On The Edge of Darkness". The characters are not as finely drawn as in her earlier successes, "Lady of Hay" and "Child of the Phoenix", nor does it contain the mind-chilling fear generated so frightfully well in "House of Echoes". Here, the frenetic state of the cruise passengers due from "exposure" to the priests and the bottle seems trite and a little too indignant to be considered realistic. There is a lot of angry repetitive conversation and a lot of toe-treading right from the start which in a normal holiday environment would not exist and could only be thought of as contrived by the author to suggest the dark behind-the-scenes workings of the priests. Even so, the events flow quickly and remain somewhat interesting due to the technique of interspercing Louisa's diary entries with corresponding moments during Anna's tour. One final problem---As the story runs on, accruing one catastrophe after another, it dies abruptly with no apparent ending or resolution other than an afterward by the author where we are told we like the characters must acknowledge the priests' evil and decide that some form of semi-unification amongst the book's persona will eventually and successfully combat it. While this ending may seem "real", it is nonetheless not a satisfacatory literary ending. The priests may or may not be subdued, nothing is rectified concretely and consequently,the reader feels taken for a ride with an appropriate destination in sight, but, alas, disappointingly never quite reaches the goal.

Hopefully, Ms Erskine's next endeavor will render a more satisfactory conclusion and rekindle that fresh interest in the unknown/occult that her earier works evoke.

This is a very exciting novel which grabs your attention from the first words. Anna is recovering from a recent divorce and decides to follow in the footsteps of her famous great grandmother, an artist of some renown, and make a trip to Egypt. She embarks on a luxury cruise from Luxor to Aswan, carrying with her two of her great grandmother Louisa's glass scent bottles and her diary. The story then switches backwards and forward to encompass the stories of both women. I found it to be a book which I couldn't put down and on several nights, was horrified to see that it was 2 am ...not only was I still engrossed, but was literally bug-eyed with the drama of it..be warned!

My book club chose this book for our most recent meeting, and I am so thrilled that we did! This has been the best non-fiction book I've read in quite some time. This was the first Barbara Erskine book I have read, but after enjoying this one so much, it will definitely not be the last! This book has it all - A GREAT READ!

This a response to the reviewer who said the diary was written in the 3rd person. Its not the diary, that we read. Anna has the only copy of the diary and it is written in the first person [see first entry of diary]. Barbara has written the diary portions of the book like its done in film. We the readers are transported back in time to watch the action unfold while unseen Anna is reading the passive diary. Diaries are not written with conversation.

This was my first Erskine book. And, based upon what I've heard about her other books, this is not her best work. It was enjoyable, but at times the story and characters just didn't hold together, and I found myself incredulously shaking my head. As someone who really likes to lose himself in a book, these moments popped me out of the story with thoughts like, "That would just never have happened."

A good illustration has to do with two of the main male characters, Andy and Toby. The heroine in the story, Anna, has a pair of important possessions, an ancient Egyptian scent bottle and a diary from her great, great (maybe one more great) grandmother, Louisa. These two men often exemplify a level of male chauvinism that would most certainly turn off any woman. Andy, in particular, repeatedly takes one or more of Anna's aforementioned possessions--"for safe keeping." There is simply no way that Anna, an intelligent woman, would allow this to continue happening without at least getting assistance from the appropriate authorities.

Also hard to believe is the fact that Anna had not read Louisa's diary prior to the time of Anna's trip to Egypt. The diary is also not written in any sort of style with which anyone would write a diary--in other words, in 3rd person. I'm very willing to suspend belief for a good story, but the stretches in this book were really too much.

With that said, the story offers some wonderful images of Egypt and was still able to hold my attention. It's not one I'll reread, recommend, or keep on the shelf, but I did deem it worth finishing.

I enjoyed this book about a haunted scent bottle. The story is told from 3 different time periods, and that makes it even more interesting and intriguing. At times it was creepy, eerie, and even a little scary. I thought the plot and ending was very complete and left me with no unanswered questions except what would happen next.... At times it was a little confusing about the different gods, priests, places, etc. but mostly I believe because I listened to this book instead of read it, so it was not as easy for me to refer back to earlier parts if need be. Learning and exploring through Egypt with the characters was enjoyable. I agree that at least some of the main characters were annoying, but I didn't think it was too odd that Serena was familiar with Isis or other egyptian rituals, etc. It made sense to me that it could easily be possible since she was on a cruise to egypt and probably had some kind of interest in the culture, history, etc. There is also a romantic aspect for the two main characters. Overall I enjoyed this ghost story and would recommend it to others. This was my first book by this author and already plan to read others by her.

This is the first book by Barbara Erskine that I've read, and this one was as an audiobook (17 hours) rather than a paperback, which can make the experience different.

Overall I was interested enough to keep reading, the setting of the book in Egypt today and of 100 years ago (through the two narrators, Anna and her great great grandmother Louisa) was very well written and it was easy to get lost into the world of Egypt whilst listening.

Anna, the modern-day heroine, is on an Egyptian cruise and takes Louisa's diary with her, which she has not previously read, along with the scent bottle that has been passed down her family from Louisa. The story of Anna unfolds at the same time as Louisa's - Anna reads Louisa's impressions of the places she visited in Egypt whilst going there herself. I enjoyed the contrast between the far less touristy Egypt of Louisa's visit in the mid 1800s, especially as this was before the building of the Aswan dam and subsequent moving and changing of many of the sites for Anna's visit.

For me, however, the supernatural element of the story didn't work very well. Louisa was given the Egyptian scent bottle by her Egyptian guide Hassan as a gift - the bottle turns out to be ancient and to be a relic that is haunted by two priests who killed each other within a temple 3000 years before. These priests are trying to come back to life and their essences are fixed around the bottle. They tend to appear and disappear again with regularity, giving Anna some spooky moments, but there doesn't seem to be a great deal of reason for the choices of when they appear.

There are parallel love interests in the story, although Anna's two beaux seem rather irritating initially. In fact, Andy, one of these men, is incredibly annoying and patronising and I found it almost incomprehensible that Anna continued to talk to him as the cruise went on. It also seemed rather amazingly convenient that another person on Anna's tour happens to have experience in Isis worship and has a mini Isis altar, as well as incense, with her on the tour. How unlikely is that!

Some people have complained that the story didn't properly end but I thought this ending worked well. You don't know what's going to happen in the future and it continued the sense of mystery.

Overall I did enjoy the book but I think I found it rather slow and turgid in places and the central theme of the book, the priests and the bottle, got a bit repetitious. Worth a read but not something to grip you from start to finish.