A convincing window into a particularly vibrant period of Scottish history.
In this debut novel set in 18th-century Scotland, a group of physicians gets caught up in disease, murder, and political intrigue.
As smallpox sweeps through Edinburgh, headstrong physician Malcolm Forrester is determined to run a study to test one of his hypotheses: that inoculating people with smallpox scabs will make them immune to the illness. Some physicians gather with him to use themselves as test subjects, but they face violent opposition from Sir Robert Turnbull, the change-fearing head of the College of Physicians; radical clerics; and the captain of the guard, Donald Mackmain, who believes the doctors are meddling with God’s will. Meanwhile, a “healer” named Elspeth MacLeod arrives in the Scottish village of Torrport to take on some of Malcolm’s patients, and quickly gets entangled in local intrigue. A woman named Lady Julianne, a relation of the leader Laird MacDuff, arrives at Elspeth’s door one rainy night and gives birth to a premature baby. After examining the woman, who survives, Elspeth suspects Julianne was poisoned. Then the laird’s second-in-command, Capt. John Spence, is found face down in a laundry tub, dead, with a bar of soap in his mouth. When Malcolm and Elspeth attempt to investigate who would want Julianne and Spence dead and why, they uncover surprising hidden ties between certain residents of the town and the Russian czar. Marsolais and Twigg pack their novel with an impressive amount of research on a very specific place and time (the spring of 1705) and its clothing, weaponry, and transportation. They also include a wealth of details about practicing medicine in that period: everything from the accepted way to treat a fistula to the era’s surgical instruments. While some of the political context has the ring of a textbook and Malcolm’s speech is riddled with comma splices (“Can’t blame him, he’s a wife and family, the rest of us are young with no dependents, expendable”), the tale is filled with lively sword fights, Scottish brogues, and colorful characters. Elspeth is especially memorable: she’s gutsy and competent, chafing against a bygone century’s restrictions on female physicians.
A convincing window into a particularly vibrant period of Scottish history.Pub Date: Dec. 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-77510-612-8
Page Count: 642
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Jan. 5, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...
Talk-show queen takes tumble as millions jeer.
Nora Bridges is a wildly popular radio spokesperson for family-first virtues, but her loyal listeners don't know that she walked out on her husband and teenaged daughters years ago and didn't look back. Now that a former lover has sold racy pix of naked Nora and horny himself to a national tabloid, her estranged daughter Ruby, an unsuccessful stand-up comic in Los Angeles, has been approached to pen a tell-all. Greedy for the fat fee she's been promised, Ruby agrees and heads for the San Juan Islands, eager to get reacquainted with the mom she plans to betray. Once in the family homestead, nasty Ruby alternately sulks and glares at her mother, who is temporarily wheelchair-bound as a result of a post-scandal car crash. Uncaring, Ruby begins writing her side of the story when she's not strolling on the beach with former sweetheart Dean Sloan, the son of wealthy socialites who basically ignored him and his gay brother Eric. Eric, now dying of cancer and also in a wheelchair, has returned to the island. This dismal threesome catch up on old times, recalling their childhood idylls on the island. After Ruby's perfect big sister Caroline shows up, there's another round of heartfelt talk. Nora gradually reveals the truth about her unloving husband and her late father's alcoholism, which led her to seek the approval of others at the cost of her own peace of mind. And so on. Ruby is aghast to discover that she doesn't know everything after all, but Dean offers her subdued comfort. Happy endings await almost everyone—except for readers of this nobly preachy snifflefest.
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with syrupy platitudes about life and love.Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-609-60737-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
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SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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