How long does it take to read Motel of the Mysteries?
Motel of the Mysteries by David Macaulay takes about 1 hour 45 minutes to read at 250 words a minute.
About 1 hour 45 minutes
An evening's read
First published 1979. 95 pages, about 26,125 words.
4 days at 30 minutes a day
Estimate based on 275 words per page.
At other speeds
| Slow, 150 words a minute | 2 hours 54 minutes |
| Average, 250 words a minute | 1 hour 45 minutes |
| Fast, 400 words a minute | 1 hour 5 minutes |
The page count is the median across 10 editions, so your copy may differ. How we calculate.
About the book
An arch and witty tale purporting to be the dissertation of some future archeologists' discovery and exploration of the "Toot and C'mon Motel" (any resemblance to a Holiday Inn and the Egyptian pharaoh is entirely intentional.) In the process, they get just about every detail wrong, surmising it to be a necropolis - does the "Plant That Would Not Die" symbolize eternal life or… wait a minute, isn't that just the ubiquitous plastic philodendron in every room? - and along the way cast doubt on what we really think we "know" about ancient Egypt. It's all enhanced by Macaulay's detailed and meticulous pen-and-ink sketches. Hilarious and memorable.
Subjects: Humor, Modern Civilization, Antiquities, Anecdotes, Egyptology, Tutankhamun
