“What to make of a book like Nile Shadows, or an author like Edward Whittemore? No matter how determinedly catholic we like to think our literary tastes, there are some works that leave our inner critic feeling uncomfortably at a loss when it first encounters them. “Yes, but is it any good?” it keeps asking with tireless persistence as the rest of us answer that question by happily turning page after page…”
Introductory essay to the 2002 Old Earth Books reprint of Nile Shadows, by the American novelist Edward Whittemore. Whittemore (1923-1995) was the author of five books set in the Middle East that earned him the status of a cult novelist and the praise of his fellow writers. Jonathan Carrroll called him “one of the great masters of magic realism,” and Tom Robbins “one of the best-kept secrets of American literature.” When Nile Shadows originally appeared in 1983, Publishers Weekly hailed it as “one of the most complex and ambitious espionage stories ever written.”
The full text, as well as more details about Edward Whittemore’s life and work, is also available on the fan site, Jerusalem Dreaming.