I put it into gear and it dies.

Either the timing light is AFU, the timing marks are wrong, the cam is "slipped" timing, or you are making some mistake.

Regardless of what the book says for initial/ idle timing, those will run at TDC
Yup. Even 5 degrees initial is usually advanced. What was the spec? 3? It mightta been 5. I've seen some late 70s stufff at 0 and even negative.