The Anubis Gates

My favorite book by Tim Powers.

i don't know what i expected when i first bought it at a used bookstore 10 years ago, but what i ended up getting was definitely something else. this might be the most bonkers book i have ever read. enjoyable, but bonkers.

This is an exciting and intricate tale involving time travel, magic, and body-swapping. Although the hero and a few other characters are 20th-century Americans, it's mostly set in London, England, of the 17th and 19th centuries, with excursions to Egypt and (briefly) Greece.

I found the story fluent and entertaining. Its magical aspects are well enough presented; its non-magical aspects strike me as having a slight touch of fantasy about them. However, it could be argued that a world in which magic works might differ subtly from ours in other ways.

One aspect of it I found unconvincing was the idea of a girl-dressed-as-boy living for months in the early 19th century with a gang of all-male beggars and outlaws, some of them highly dangerous, without being found out by anyone. It's not only implausible that she succeeded; it's implausible that she'd voluntarily put herself into that situation. Couldn't she find any lower-risk way to pursue her quest for revenge?

I generally prefer sf to fantasy, and this is clearly fantasy, but it's a relatively restrained kind of fantasy, using magic only occasionally and for fairly limited purposes.

It's a pity that there are few likeable characters in it. I suppose Jacky is the best of them; the hero Brendan is inoffensive but only mildly likeable.

I'm reviewing the book after reading it once. I may have more to add after I get around to rereading it.