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A sizzling new novel set in Taos, New Mexico. The third in the Justine Trilogy, preceded by the award-winning, The Cairo Codex and The Italian Letters. Buy it at your local independent bookstore, 
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The Glorious Shepheard Hotel, Cairo
Nothing was more romantic in The English Patient than the scenes in the old Shepheard Hotel. It burned down in the aftermath of the ’52 revolution. Here are some nostalgic meanderings from The Cairo Codex:
“Justine gazed up at the towering façade and memories of the original Shepheard crowded her mind. The memories were older than she was and didn’t belong to her, but rather to her grandmother Laurence, who had spent many afternoons having tea on the sweeping terrace with her parents.
She remembered hearing stories of the great hotel as the playground of adventurers and travelers from all over the world. The shaded terrace where her grandmother must have sat in deep wicker chairs held a commanding view of Ibrahim Pasha Street. The grand entrance encircled a spiral staircase leading to the Moorish Hall, deliciously cool and dimly lit by rays coming through a huge dome of colored glass. Laurence had described plump, embroidered chairs set around little octagonal tables. Intimacy with discretion had been the watchwords of its glamorous clientele…Churchill, Lawrence of Arabia, Roosevelt, princes, sheiks, queens, and great authors. The original Shepheard, like the glory days of Cairo, had been consumed by fire some fifty-five years ago.”
But today’s Shepheard, where we lived when first we moved to Cairo, then returned to over and over, has few regrets. It now sets on the Nile and boasts of lavish and glorious surroundings:
“The old Shepheard did not have a monopoly on ornate beauty, she realized. Chandeliers of amber glass reflected on richly carved wood known as mashrabaya, accented with lines of exquisite arabesque lettering. Gothic arches and flourishing palms towered over marble floors, and lamps shaped like lotuses lit the room. Above, a marble balcony circled the eastern side of the room, serving as counterpoint to the huge windows overlooking the Corniche and the Nile to the west.”
During your visit to Cairo, I would highly recommend the two-level rooms in the Shepheard overlooking the Nile…. Starting soon, the three-part series, Following in the Footsteps of The Cairo Codex: 72 Hours in Cairo, begins.
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