This is an intriguing and remarkable book. The opening chapters follow the growing awareness of the child Hatshepsut, from earliest memories through childhood education through her gradual assumption of exceptional political power. The story also serves as a kind of exploration of fundamental concepts of Egyptian religious and civilizational philosophy. Some of that is made explicit and some implied, so there is an interesting experience for the reader in interpreting the Egyptian world view from the words and clues offered especially in the earlier parts of the book. You see the world of Egypt as Hatshepsut sees it, and that world assembles for you as Hatshepsut's mind puts it together in her own perspective. Put another way, you are learning about the Egyptian world as Hatshepsut does. The novel is about the inner life of its subject, and although it is written in the third person it is Hatshepsut's mind that is the real narrator.
On one level, this is a spiritual, intellectual and political adventure story, about how Hatshepsut unexpectedly became possibly the most powerful head-of-state of her time. On another level, the novel is a work of anthropological fiction, in which the invented details of the story are used to describe the culture of ancient Egypt. That culture is rich (in all senses of the term), complex and subtle, and the author handles its exposition skillfully. This is not a "snapshot" of ancient Egypt, but rather a richly-formed evocation of what is for all of us an alternate universe, complete with details of landscape and material culture, a complex economy and a distinct way of life, in a lost world and a distant civilization.
I found myself taking a leisurely time reading this novel, because I enjoyed lingering over and rereading so much of it. Partly that was because the Egyptian world view as elaborated in this book is so alien to our own that I wanted to immerse myself in it, just for the joy of discovery, as when learning a new language. Beyond that, the writing is frequently and strikingly poetic. The book's very title, which the author explains in her introductory notes, is itself an example of that. The narrative is filled with imaginative moments that often made me stop in my tracks and be fascinated by the words themselves. Some examples, among many, include: "The pyramid's gleaming point sent long, luminous arms directly into her squinting eyes and she felt it silently telling her something wonderful."....or: "She was not at all nervous about leaving home because everyone who lived in her heart was going with her."....or: "The mountain became a closed door locked by magic."
It must have taken a great amount of work and, really, faith to produce Truth is the Soul of the Sun. Beyond the wide reading on Egyptian antiquities that this surely involved, there was also the crafting of all that information into a story that demanded narrative and drama, and the challenge of imagining this world in multiple dimensions and describing it in terms of human experience and events. That the author seems to accomplish this almost casually is itself a compliment to her art and ability.
One reviewer, who was otherwise appreciative, commented that the novel was "slow moving" and did not possess enough sturm und drang. My counter-argument is that the novel is relatively realistic in that most people most of the time live lives of significance without formulaic drama, and that a good story can still be thoughtful and focused on the less violent challenges that life throws at us all every day. One of the aspects of this book that I enjoyed was its constant exploration of significance in the normal and its sense of the magic of ordinary life, even in life lived by a monarch.
There are books one reads quickly, mostly to be mildly amused and to get to the end to find out "what happened." This is not one of them. This one is worth a much more reflective approach, and is more like a journey with an unknown end than a fast read. I enjoyed reading this book like I enjoy travelling, stopping at suddenly-discovered points to look at and linger over something strange and marvelous without regard to schedule. I recommend this book for other "travellers" who wish from the books they read not so much to be amused as to be amazed and delighted by a trip to another world. All I can judge a book on is how successfully it intrigues me and gets me out of my own head and into another realm for a short while. That's why I'm rating this particular book with five stars. The author has a talent for creating alternate worlds for a reader to explore, and that aspect of Truth is the Soul of the Sun, among others, puts it way ahead of most works of fiction.
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Top reviews from other countries
A. Drysder
Not as good as I expected
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 29, 2013