'A gripping historical novel of medicine & murder from bestselling author Chris Brookmyre and consultant anaesthetist Dr Marisa Haetzman, set in nineteenth-century Edinburgh.'
The Art of Dying by Ambrose Parry is historical crime fiction that blends fact and fiction perfectly to create a compelling read.
Ambrose Parry is a pseudonym for a collaboration between Chris Brookmyre and Marisa Haetzman. The couple are married and live in Scotland. Chris Brookmyre is the international bestselling and multi-award-winning author of over twenty novels, including Black Widow, winner of both the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year and the McIlvanney Prize for Scottish Crime Novel of the Year.
Dr Marisa Haetzman is a consultant anaesthetist of twenty years’ experience, whose research for her Master’s degree in the History of Medicine uncovered the material upon which this novel was based. The Way of All Flesh is the first book in the series, The Art of Dying is the second in this historical crime series.
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About the book
Review
This is the second book featuring Sarah Fisher and Will Raven. If you haven't read The Way of All Flesh I highly recommend it, however it is worth noting that both books can be read as standalone novels.
Follow @ambroseparry on Twitter, on Goodreads, on Amazon, Buy The Art of Dying
Edinburgh, 1849. Hordes of patients are dying all across the city, with doctors finding their remedies powerless. And a campaign seeks to paint Dr James Simpson, pioneer of medical chloroform, as a murderer.
Determined to clear Simpson’s name, his protégé Will Raven and former housemaid Sarah Fisher must plunge into Edinburgh’s deadliest streets and find out who or what is behind the deaths. Soon they discover that the cause of the deaths has evaded detection purely because it is so unthinkable.
This is the second book featuring Sarah Fisher and Will Raven. If you haven't read The Way of All Flesh I highly recommend it, however it is worth noting that both books can be read as standalone novels.
A few years have passed since Raven and Fisher solved their first crimes and went their separate ways. For some reason Raven seems to think swanning off to embark on a prestigious path of education for quite some time made time come to a complete standstill where Sarah is concerned. I truly believe he expected to find her still working as a housemaid for Dr Simpson.
Not that it isn't an assumption that wouldn't usually be true of a young woman in that era, however he seems to have forgotten just how ambitious Sarah is. In a way Raven is also guilty of adhering to the patriarchal systems and automatically presuming Sarah will not advance in her own endeavours to educate herself and become part of the medical establishment.
Sarah the housemaid is now Sarah the respectable wife of a man who supports her ambitions and thirst for knowledge. The fact Sarah isn't found pining and waiting awakens Raven to his feelings for her.
This time the two of them are caught up in a malicious campaign to ruin the career of a man they both respect. Little do they know that behind all the whispers something and someone more nefarious lurks.
It's historical crime fiction that blends fact and fiction perfectly to create a compelling read. Parry is right up there with Sansom and Perry, although I would argue that Parry focuses on medical crime of the time period and is less inclined to pull pure political machinations into the plot.
The series is entertaining and riveting, and at times also an intriguing learning experience, which is the best kind of historical fiction.
Buy The Art of Dying at Amazon Uk or go to Goodreads for any other retailer. Publisher: Canongate Books; pub date 29 Aug. 2019. Buy at Amazon com. Buy at Hive.co.uk. Bookshop org. Waterstones.
Read my review of The Way of All Flesh Buy The Way of All Flesh
Not that it isn't an assumption that wouldn't usually be true of a young woman in that era, however he seems to have forgotten just how ambitious Sarah is. In a way Raven is also guilty of adhering to the patriarchal systems and automatically presuming Sarah will not advance in her own endeavours to educate herself and become part of the medical establishment.
Sarah the housemaid is now Sarah the respectable wife of a man who supports her ambitions and thirst for knowledge. The fact Sarah isn't found pining and waiting awakens Raven to his feelings for her.
This time the two of them are caught up in a malicious campaign to ruin the career of a man they both respect. Little do they know that behind all the whispers something and someone more nefarious lurks.
It's historical crime fiction that blends fact and fiction perfectly to create a compelling read. Parry is right up there with Sansom and Perry, although I would argue that Parry focuses on medical crime of the time period and is less inclined to pull pure political machinations into the plot.
The series is entertaining and riveting, and at times also an intriguing learning experience, which is the best kind of historical fiction.
Buy The Art of Dying at Amazon Uk or go to Goodreads for any other retailer. Publisher: Canongate Books; pub date 29 Aug. 2019. Buy at Amazon com. Buy at Hive.co.uk. Bookshop org. Waterstones.
Read my review of The Way of All Flesh Buy The Way of All Flesh
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