Egypt, the Old Kingdom. The king is dead, and in nine days whoever stands beside the capstone of his pyramid at Giza will be crowned. Far upriver at Abu, Meret, a boatwoman who cannot read, is about to lose her battered reed boat to her creditor Hapu. So she takes old Ipi's oddly generous job: grain for Giza's starving workers, and sealed letters to collect from temples downstream. A sun-drenched river epic of wry humor and royal stakes.