Medium – Book
About the Book – Set in Victorian Edinburgh, this story is the second in a series based around a group of doctors, their assistants and families who are on the forefront of medical research in Edinburgh’s New Town. Dr Will Raven is recently returned to Edinburgh after a trip abroad, where he fully qualified as a doctor. He returns to work with his previous mentor, Professor Simpson, who is a doctor famous throughout Edinburgh for his championing of chloroform, especially for childbirth. Also working at Simpson’s practice is Sarah Fisher, an old flame of Will’s, who is now married to another doctor, Archie Banks. A few weeks after Will returns, a series of murders start to rock Edinburgh, and at the beginning, the blame is turned to Simpson and chloroform. Sarah and Will decide to team up to find the true murderer – but as the deaths stack up, are they getting too close to danger?
My Rating – 2.5/5
My thoughts – This book was one of those that I think would have been more enjoyable if it was a bit shorter and had fewer subplots. The original thing that attracted me to the book was the setting – Victorian Edinburgh. It combines two of my favourite things – the Victorian era (one of my favourite periods in history) and Edinburgh (my favourite city in the world!). The author certainly had the feel of Edinburgh right – as he describes the journeys of the characters through the city, I could picture the places that they were in and the buildings that they were seeing. The Victorian era was also evoked well, with the mix of rich and poor, and the medical advances being made at the time. The book just seemed a bit ‘busy’ and I couldn’t keep track of some of the subplots which wended their way through the book.
The characters were OK, although Will Raven (who I admit does become more likable through the books) was not my favourite. Sarah was the typical amateur detective heroine, and I can’t really pick out anything to really write about her, except that she is almost the embodiment of the ‘woman before her time’ trope. The book was quite cleverly divided up, with chapters every so often from the point of view of the murderer’s diary, and the murderer herself (that’s not a spoiler as it’s stated from the beginning!) is quite creepy and has some interesting motives. This book was one which sat awkwardly for me – not comforting enough to be a cozy crime, nor thrilling enough to be a proper thriller book.
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