This blog and the related set of Twitter snippets …. rememberingbarbara@mpmmanor ….. were started to share memories of Barbara Mertz / Elizabeth Peters / Barbara Michaels — and to keep the conversations she started going….
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remembering barbara mertz 
September 20, 2015 at 4:11 pm
Happy to have come across this site. Barbara was the mother of a childhood friend of mine and I always remember her with great pleasure. I have enjoyed reading her books and even used Red Land, Black Land with students in my college-level “Humanities” class. We were all really sorry about her passing, the world has lost a fine person as well as a marvelously creative one.
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April 27, 2016 at 5:54 pm
I’m Anne King, Stewart’s mother and probably Barbara’s oldest friend–having assisted in the birth of Amelia. Barbara and I share a history and a great friendship dating from times before we each found our way in the world. I miss a part of me with her.
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April 2, 2018 at 4:38 am
I’m glad to have found this site, I recently discovered the Amelia Peabody series and love these charming stories. A friend told me she (Elizabeth Peters) was one of her very favorite authors.
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June 7, 2018 at 9:17 pm
We’re so glad to hear that you’re enjoying Amelia and Company ! If you use Twitter or Facebook, be sure to check out the conversations happening there as well on our pages as well as those of some great reader groups.
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June 7, 2018 at 8:37 pm
I’m so happy you’re keeping Elizabeth Peters/Barbara Michaels/Barbara Mertz’s memory alive with this website. I read my first Peters novel in 1976 or so – The Murders of Richard III, and have been a fan ever since. Not so much of the Barbara Michaels persona – though I live Shattered Silk – but everything that she wrote as Elizabeth Peters and as Barbara Mertz!
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June 7, 2018 at 9:20 pm
Thank you, it’s great to hear from you! Are you into vintage clothing? We posted some pics of Barbara’s collection earlier on this blog … she was serious about it!! Cheers from the crew at “MPM” (Mertz/Peters/Michaels)
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March 15, 2019 at 3:46 am
I am a tortured soul since there will be no more Amelia Peabody books. I was enraptured with the first book I read by Elizabeth Peters and Barbara Michaels. I quickly went out and bought all of the books and waited patiently for the next one to come out. I was devastated when Barbara Mertz passed away. Now I will never know all that happened with the Emerson/Peabody family and their legacy. Is there any chance of other unpublished works to be published. I have yet to find another author that can even compare to her writing skills and that I enjoy reading so immensely.
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June 30, 2019 at 9:15 pm
One solace is that “Tomb of the Golden Bird” is really meant to be the finale of the series. The books written after that went back to fill in “missing” seasons, but Barbara meant readers to feel as if the series had been finished. Also, the book she was writing at the time of her death, “The Painted Queen,” was finished by her dear friend Joan Hess (who has sadly since passed away herself — see the posts on this blog).
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April 28, 2019 at 8:29 pm
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2019/apr/26/ancient-egypt-amarna-akhenaten-rebel-king-arab-spring-revolution?utm_term=RWRpdG9yaWFsX1RoZUxvbmdSZWFkLTE5MDQyNw%3D%3D&utm_source=esp&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=TheLongRead&CMP=longread_email
If you make it all the way through this article on ancient Egypt, there is an interesting paragraph – that series of mystery novels which inspired Laurel Bestock, has to be Amelia Peabody!
‘Foreign scholars often made similar points, although I noticed a generational difference. Laurel Bestock, a young professor at Brown University, expressed discomfort with the situation, and even questioned the origins of her own love for the field. As a girl, Bestock dreamed of going to the Sahara after reading a series of mystery novels about Egyptology. “I think this is part of our legacy of not confronting colonialism,” she said. “Our own interest was started so young. It wasn’t a considered, adult interest; it was a childhood fascination. The academic interest grew out of the fascination. It’s very hard for us to justify our own interest, because it’s essentially childish in its conception.”’
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June 30, 2019 at 9:12 pm
This is great! We’ve heard that quite a few Egyptologists mention Barbara Mertz’s work as part of their “gateway” into loving Ancient Egypt. In addition to Amelia, they also mention her 2 non-fiction books — Temples, Tombs, and Hieroglyphs, and Red Land, Black Land … Thanks for sharing this!
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December 19, 2021 at 4:01 am
I was so happy to find this site! My sister brought home ‘Crocodile on the Sandbank’ when I was about 12 years old and it was love at first read. I signed the notes I passed back and forth with a boy in my freshman algebra class ‘Amelia Peabody,’ and carried a Jacqueline Kirby gigantic purse, replete with a random jar of water that I actually used one time after I walked through the mud in white shoes. My sister and I are in our 50s now. Barbara’s books, both as Elizabeth Peters and Barbara Michaels, have been an important part of both our lives all our lives. I will never forget the awful suspense of waiting for ‘The Ape Who Guards the Balance’ and ‘Night Train to Memphis’ to come out. Tenterhooks so many times waiting to find out what would come next, and she never disappointed. I am very sad she’s gone, and so grateful for all those years of wonderful reading. Much love to all her loved ones.
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September 29, 2022 at 8:06 pm
Here’s to 12-year-olds carrying gigantic purses with jars of water!!! What a wonderful story, and perfect for this day when we are celebrating what would have been her 95th birthday! Thank you!
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September 29, 2022 at 8:37 pm
Raised a glass to MPM yesterday in memory of her birthday (Antipodes time)
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