User Reviews
Rating: really liked it
This concept needs to be confiscated from Sarah Penner immediately and given to literally any other writer.
Between the lovely cover, the book of the month club endorsement and the promise of a Georgian female serial killer working on behalf of wronged women, I was so excited for this book. To say it was a letdown is a massive understatement.
I was expecting a sort of “How’d she get away with it” revenge narrative about a woman who has been pushed to the brink by the cruelty of men and good-old-fashioned 1790s misogyny. I was expecting a deep dive into this woman’s character that would either be thrillerish or a more lighthearted caper-style romp. I was down for either of those.
What I got was The Davinci Code:
For Her.
With an inexplicable dash of Julie & Julia.
The story goes back and forth between 3 POV characters. There’s Nella, the apothecary owner who poisons people, Eliza the twelve-year-old girl who’s a little too chill about poisoning a guy, (so far so good), and then there’s Caroline. Caroline is a present-day character who finds a vial on the bank of the Thames that came from Nella’s apothecary.
Caroline has just gone to London without her husband because she found out he was cheating on her. The book did a really good job of making me think her husband sucked right away—but it did an even better job of convincing me that Caroline sucked.
She just doesn’t make a whole lot of sense and many of her actions defy any kind of human logic (same is true of her husband, I’ll get to that in a minute). Right away we find out that ~she’s not like other girls~ because while everyone else went to coffee shops in college, she poured over ~historical documents ~ and read ~novels from the 1800s~. Things no other college student has ever done.
If you think I’m kidding here’s the actual line: “I could lose myself for hours in these seemingly meaningless documents, while my classmates met at coffee shops to study. I couldn’t attribute my unconventional interests to anything specific, I only knew that classroom debates about civil revolution and power-hungry world leaders left me yawning.” (Page 17) (Yes, somehow, we are not even 20 pages in).
The first person makes that attitude especially insufferable. She then gets married to James, a man who seems hell bent on making her feel dumb. Great start. Shocked he cheated.
Anyway, after college, Caroline seems to be angry that reading books and ~historical documents~ didn’t immediately get her a job. A twist no one saw coming. She almost applies to Cambridge but then doesn’t because she marries James the Jackass—and we all know that you can either have a degree or a husband. She chooses husband and her husband wants to stay in the states. Little known fact I learned from this book, literally no university in the states offers a master’s degree. They only count if they’re from Cambridge. Oxford isn’t mentioned so unclear if their masters’ degrees count for anything.
Here’s where Caroline completely lost me: she kinda takes her anger about not being handed a job because she likes books out on… **checks notes** the books? Here’s a direct quote: “…thinking only briefly of the boxes still in our basement, packed away with the dozens of books I’d adored in school. Northanger Abbey, Rebecca, Mrs.Dalloway. What good had they done me?”
She swears off books for good and gets a clerk job at her family’s farm. I have a lot of questions about that, but the novel answers none of them. She finally gets a job doing admin work for the family farm apparently unaware that you can still read books if you have a day job.
Then she becomes obsessed with getting pregnant. We have not yet hit page 30.
Spoilers beyond this point! (I highly recommend you don’t waste your time on this novel, but if you still think you might read it and care about spoilers this is a good place to stop). Here’s a quick rundown of the female characters in this book:
Nella: Wishes she was pregnant.
Caroline: Wished she was pregnant, spends majority of book thinking she is pregnant.
Lady Clarence: Wants to murder her husband’s lover so she can get pregnant.
Eliza: Is 12 and thankfully is not pregnant but she does think her period is a ghost which I think deserves an honorable mention.
Gaynor: Is actually a historian and is, of course, exempt from pregnancy and thoughts thereof.
Yikes.
I would be willing to roll with this if it wasn’t such a high percentage of female characters and if it was examined or dealt with in any kind of thoughtful way. It is not. In fact, the desire to be pregnant/ have a child pops up in the weirdest ways at the weirdest times. Caroline by far wins most bizarre. Her husband is puking blood and the EMTs are telling her she should probably get rid of the stuff her husband ingested, especially if there are kids around. She then is upset that she doesn’t have a kid to potentially get poisoned / witness their father get carried away on a stretcher.
Which brings me to another weird-ass plot point. James is so upset that Caroline is mad at him for having an affair he willingly drinks just a little bit of toxic Eucalyptus oil to…**checks notes again** get her to stop being mad at him via medical emergency. Because nothing says “honey, let’s get back together” like puking blood in a hotel room in foreign country.
And then there’s Caroline’s discovery of the apothecary. This is where we get The Davinci Code: For Her. She finds the vial. Then she miraculously finds the apothecary. There’s just been this door in the middle of urban London that somehow no one else has seen since 1790. No one tore it down to build luxury flats! The Nazis bombed around it! Everyone who lives on that alley just kind of pretends it’s not there! She finds it in about two minutes. She finds all these documents inside from 1791, touches them with her bare hands, messes up one of them and then ultimately just takes cellphone pics and leaves them all there. She then tells Gaynor, her buddy at the British Library all about it and Gaynor thinks it’s interesting but sees no need to go get the documents out of the forgotten cellar thing. Historians and librarians are both known for being super chill about old documents being exposed to the elements, so this makes sense.
Caroline then reads the pictures of the documents and reads some articles Gaynor the Historian found for her. She’s shocked to find out that they match up perfectly and she’s able to jump to all sorts of conclusions without so much as an additional Google search. Incredible research skills. All that time she spent not at coffee shops clearly paid off.
You may be wondering what’s going on in the 1790s, apothecary of poisons part of the novel. You know, the part that sounded interesting. Well, it was somehow really boring despite there being two murders and a police chase. Oh, at one point the 12-year-old throws herself off of Blackfriars Bridge but she survives impact and icy water because she… **checks notes a third time** drank a tincture that made her really warm…
At the end the police are pretty sure Nella is the poisoner they’re after, but ultimately let her go because they decide in the middle of the street, after the chase, that they don’t have enough evidence to arrest a low-ish class woman. So that’s nice of them. Really feels authentic for 1791.
At the end of the book Caroline does dump James & the Giant Jackass, but possibly only temporarily. There’s an implication that after some time apart and after Caroline finishes her masters’ degree in Cambridge they could get back together. It’s left open-ended. I don’t have a joke here, I just hate that.
Caroline does submit an application to Cambridge. I guess she forgave the books for not getting her a job after all. It’ll be tough to get in of course. Especially because that’s literally the only school where you can get a Master’s.
She talks to Gaynor The Actual Professional Researcher about how she wants to write a dissertation about the apothecary. Guess what Caroline is getting a degree in? If you guessed History you are entirely too logical for this novel. No, she’s getting a degree in English literature specifically she’s applied for a program that covers “18th century and Romanticism” You may notice that’s two centuries and two very different periods of literature jammed together, but at this point who’s counting.
This book ends all too soon. We are robbed of the Cambridge professor’s reaction when she tells them her dissertation will be—not on a work of literature—but a ledger she found in a mysterious basement. Would love to be a fly on the wall for that one.
In short, my sanity has suffered. 0/10 do not recommend.
Rating: really liked it
How can this story be so dull? It's about a secret apothecary that dispenses poison to women so that they can kill their nearest and dearest, for crying out loud!
It starts off with much promise. In the 18th century, we meet Nella, an apothecarist who has been making poison for decades. Women come to her when they have nowhere else to turn, and she provides them with the method to kill their problems. When a young girl named Eliza enters her shop, it sets in motion a chain of events from which there is no turning back. In the present, we also follow history buff Caroline as she vacations in London and researches the apothecary from centuries ago.
The book blurb completely grabbed me. I was ready for excitement and suspense, especially because it also promises to have a mystery and a little bit of magical realism/fantasy sprinkled in. So I started reading and turning the pages, waiting for something riveting to grab ahold of me. And unfortunately, nothing ever did.
To say this story is slow is an understatement. With a dual timeline, there's always this fear that one of them might be more compelling than the other, and that's definitely what happened here. The storyline with Nella and Eliza is the focal point. But even then, what should have been a fascinating narrative quickly becomes plodding. It feels like the exciting moments are glossed over quickly and the mundane ones are stretched out to fill up the pages.
It doesn't help that Caroline's story is completely unnecessary. I can see that the author is trying to juxtapose Caroline's personal growth with what happened to Nella and Eliza, but it just doesn't work, mostly because there are no similarities other than trivial ones. I didn't understand why Caroline would be interested in looking into the apothecary, or why she tried to keep it a secret from everyone, or really anything she did.
This story also employs one of my pet peeves, which is that pretty much every conflict comes from a misunderstanding that can be quickly explained away with a sentence or two. Not telling the truth isn't that interesting of a plot device. And also every character makes a mountain out of a molehill, whether it's deciding to panic or pulling meaning out of irrelevant conversations or interactions.
For me, this is a case where the book overpromised and underdelivered. Based on the description of the book, I expected mystery and intrigue, darkness, suspense, magical realism. But none of these occurred because the book is 100% historical fiction, and it wasn't a very interesting one at that. Instead, it became a slogfest through an utterly forgettable story, one I'm already having trouble remembering only days after finishing it.
This was my Book of the Month pick for March. If you're curious about BOTM or want to find out how to get your first book for $5, click here.
Rating: really liked it
An avenger female who can concoct poisonous formulas to help you get rid of man trouble. This hell of an outstanding synopsis idea put this book on my radar!
To the attention of the abusers, cheaters, bullies and most disgusting human wastes who treat the women like doormats: you should beware because there is an intelligent, vicious angel of death who is also apothecary is coming after you!
Nella is a ghost, wowed to help the mentally and physically hurt women who needs her support, hiding behind the secret walls of small store, conducting her business discreetly. She is playing by the rules: Rule number 1:She has two basic rules: those concoctions she dispensed cannot be used to harm another woman!
Rule number 2:Names of murderer and victims must be recorded at the apothecary’s register.
When she starts to form a unique friendship with Eliza Fanning who is only 12, working at the store with her, a string of unfortunate events put her and the women whose names are recorded at register in danger to be exposed.
At the present time, we’re introduced to aspiring historian Caroline Parcewell who plans to celebrate her tenth year anniversary with her beloved husband. But as long as she finds out her husband dearest is a cheating bastard, she travels alone to London, meeting with a mudlarking group on the shores of Thames. As she mucks through the water, she finds a glass vial which brings out so many secrets and with the help of an employee from British library she finds herself digging out to solve 200 years long mystery. Those three women’s paths cross and Caroline gets closer to solve the secrets behind apothecary murders!
This is so much exciting, mysterious and intriguing than I ever imagine. After finishing this book, I decided to read more about mudlarking and since I’ve read the story about Mary Ann Cotton who had poisoned nearly 21 victims at the 19th century, I want to take a time travel trip and search for more intriguing stories.
Overall: Attention capturing, well- developed story with impeccable characterization and high tense, gothic, dark atmosphere won my heart! I truly enjoyed it! I have to congratulate Sarah Penner for her brilliant debut!
Special thanks to NetGalley and HARLEQUIN / Park Row for sharing this incredible ARC with me in exchange my honest opinions.
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Rating: really liked it
Feeling cute, might apply to Cambridge later 🙄
Rating: really liked it
Dear Reader,
Last summer, long before lockdown, I found myself standing in the mud of the River Thames in central London, wearing blue rubber gloves and a pair of old tennis shoes. I was mudlarking—hunting the river for old treasures, which is the inspiration for my debut novel, The Lost Apothecary. Given such an adventure would be impossible right now, I hope my novel provides you an opportunity to escape back in time and embark on a story that begins with one woman’s discovery of a mysterious vial on the banks of the River Thames. The vial is connected to a string of unsolved murders two centuries ago and the female poisoner behind them—an apothecary who sells well-disguised poisons to other women seeking freedom from the men who have wronged them.
The Lost Apothecary is very much a story about women controlling their own destinies. There are dark aspects to the story—like the burden of secrets and the destructive pursuit of vengeance—but it is also a story of hope and the way women can protect, honor, and free one another, even when separated by the barrier of time. While researching this book, I loved digging into historical documents and antiquated ephemera, particularly those relating to eighteenth-century London. Over the last few years, I’ve happily passed many an afternoon in the Rare Books room of the British Library, my head buried in fragile manuscripts from bygone eras. I’ve studied firsthand accounts of apothecaries, druggists, and poisoners. (I know enough to be dangerous, as they say.) So, although The Lost Apothecary is a work of fiction, I have done my best to research and craft a story that is true to history.
As lockdowns continue and many of us turn to books to escape our present reality, I hope you feel swept away by the mysterious world of The Lost Apothecary and the complex female heroines at its heart. You will become familiar with the secret apothecary shop and the many vials lining the shelves—their contents, their preparations, their sinister uses—and peek into the apothecary’s register of names, discovering who stepped through her hidden door in pursuit of poison. And you will, of course, be alongside the apothecary when the unthinkable happens and her greatest secret is exposed.
I invite you now to leave your own lockdown, if only in your imagination, and join me on the banks of the River Thames. Together, we can begin to unbury the secrets belonging to the lost apothecary. I only ask that you tread carefully—for the apothecary is a clever woman and a master of disguise.
Cheers,
Sarah Penner
Rating: really liked it
i always admit that im not a fan of history. but then i pick up a brilliant work of historical fiction and i daydream about life as a historian. and right now, im imagining the atmosphere of 1790s london.
this story immediate transports the reader into bustling streets, shadow covered back alleys, and dusty apothecary shelves. ive always found old, natural remedies of the past fascinating, so i enjoyed reading about that aspect of the book. it was also rewarding seeing how nelly uses her knowledge to help other woman. i was completely drawn into her world.
and this easily would have been a 5 star read for me if carolines present day POV chapters had been removed entirely. i honestly dont feel like her or her storyline added anything to the book. yeah, i guess its somewhat touching that she felt connected to history, but i think nelly and elizas story deserved those pages more.
regardless, this is an captivating portrayal of womens history and some of the secrets london keeps.
↠4.5 stars
Rating: really liked it
Here is my video for the 8 Reasons The Lost Apothecary Disappointed: https://youtu.be/Y31NwKJcfA4
That video is also good for a few laughs - I was in a silly mood.
There are two rules. One: Poison cannot be used against another woman. Two: The name of the victim and the poisoner must be recorded in a book. The apothecary is used to helping out women when she is surprised to see a young woman entering her shop one day. As the apothecary gets to know the young woman, another threatens her very existence.
When I picked up this book, I thought it would be something similar to Dexter-style justice; however, there wasn't enough of that and too much Caroline. Sweet Caroline who was constantly whining about her husband James. Every single problem in her life was somehow the fault of James. I didn't care for any of the sections coming from Caroline.
But seriously....watch the video! It's hilarious!
2022 Reading Schedule
Jan Animal Farm
Feb Lord of the Flies
Mar The Da Vinci Code
Apr Of Mice and Men
May Memoirs of a Geisha
Jun Little Women
Jul The Lovely Bones
Aug Charlotte's Web
Sep Life of Pi
Oct Dracula
Nov Gone with the Wind
Dec The Secret Garden
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Rating: really liked it
I am aware that my feedback on this novel will take me to the minority club, unfortunately, I expected much, much more ... Having waited for several months, I was eager to start the audiobook, however, despite good narrators, the book did not deliver. Why? Some moments I found implausible, and I do not mean the dual timeline, not at all. In fact, if you asked me when the book is set, I would be able to define the time only because the dates are given in the book. I did not find anything unique about the historical background, it well could be one hundred years earlier or later. I did find the past much more interesting than the present since the problems Caroline has to tackle do not make me care for her. Sounds like I am heartless, that may be, but it is the superficial way in which they are depicted that did not evoke emotions in me.
The best part is mudlarking of which I have read a book or two and which sounds fascinating to me.
Still, I am glad to have read a book which is so popular with readers at present and I do hope it brings them more joy than it was in my case.
Rating: really liked it
Once again, we have an historical fiction using the split time period device. And once again, I was not taken by the present day story. The historic story grabbed me. It’s 1791 and Nella is a woman’s apothecary, providing formulas for all sorts of women’s problems, especially problem men. When 12 year old Eliza is sent to her shop for a “remedy”, they form a friendship. Unfortunately, it’s not long before a client seeks to violate one of Nella’s rules (harm no women) and everything is put at risk.
Caroline is the character from the present day. She’s come to London on what should have been her tenth anniversary trip. But she just caught her husband cheating, so instead she’s on her own. While mudlarking, she finds an antique apothecary’s bottle and her interest is piqued. Caroline seems nothing more than a means to advance Nella’s story. Caroline herself is the typical story of a woman growing into her own independence.
I had one other problem with this historical fiction. I want my historical fiction to be as much a lesson where I learn about a time or place, as a good story. I didn’t feel I really learned anything here. It’s a decent story and if that’s all you want, it does the trick. It’s a quick bit of entertainment. I would have preferred a story that delved deeper into the characters, especially Nella. The endings for both stories seem contrived and the pieces of the story fall too easily in place. Oh, if only my historic research was as easy as Caroline’s!
I both read and listened to this book. The writing lacked a meaningful difference in the voices, despite a 200+ year difference in time. The narrators made up for this a little, and I give them credit for bringing the characters to life.
My thanks to netgalley, Harper Audio and Harlequin Books for advance copies of this story.
Rating: really liked it
Now a Goodreads Choice finalist in Historical Fiction and Debut Novel! 🤔
Well I think this is another case of my expectations being far different than what the book ended up being. Maybe I can’t really fault the author for that, but honestly after reading the description I just thought this was going to be something else entirely.
I mean based off of these quotes:
“female apothecary secretly dispenses poisons to liberate women from the men who have wronged them”
“unsolved ‘apothecary murders’ that haunted London“
“not everyone will survive”
I thought that
The Lost Apothecary would be a kind of dark, twisted tale of morally-grey women who are acting on some of their most sinister impulses. I wanted to see more of a tug of war between their feelings of self-preservation and self-interest. Instead, this felt sanitized. I wasn’t conflicted at all while reading, mostly because there was very little conflict. The three main characters, an old apothecary named Nella & a young girl Eliza from the 18th century, as well as Caroline, a young woman in modern day, spent most of their time hemming and hawing over the possible
implications of things that don’t ever come to pass.
In a word, I was bored. I wanted more from this book. It was as if the author wrote a feel-good version of what could have been a really interesting story. All the components promised in the synopsis were there: poisons, secrets, infidelity, etc. But I just did not feel like the stakes were raised to that level. And the instinct to tie everything up with a bow at the end missed the mark for me.
I don’t know. I know a lot of people have liked it so far. I think the impulse to create a certain kind of Strong Female Character has removed any ambiguity from their actions. It’s okay for there to be complicated female characters who are sometimes in the wrong. The men depicted in this book are so flat and inconsequential that it’s hard to even believe they have the capacity to oppress anybody. The author really pulled out all the stops to try and get the main characters to seem like they had no choice and every justification, but I just couldn’t get on board. If you’re going to be an apothecary who dispenses poisons to scorned women, then
own it, don’t pretend it’s some kind of noble cause.
I thought the writing outside of that was good, though. I also did like the narrators, although one of their voices started to sound really robotic if I cranked up the speed. That seems more likely to be a production issue, and I think the three women who voiced the different points of view, Nella (Lorna Bennet), Caroline (Lauren Anthony) and Eliza (Lauren Irwin), did an excellent job.
I’m interested to potentially read more from Sarah Penner, but this just wasn’t my type of book. There’s a lot of stories coming out along these lines lately that better represent the complexity of women from history. Still, I’m sure plenty of readers will enjoy
The Lost Apothecary as is.
*Thanks to Harper/Harlequin Audio & Netgalley for an advance copy!**
For more book talk & reviews, follow me on Instagram at @elle_mentbooks!
Rating: really liked it
It’s fitting that I write this review today, because 230 years ago today on Feb. 10, 1791, the events that changed the lives of our three main characters: Nella, Eliza and Caroline took place.
Who are these three?
First, there’s Nella, the apothecary. Her timeline takes place in 1791. After the death of her mother 20 years prior, she’s been running her mother’s apothecary shop which has had a long history of helping women with whatever ails them. The only difference is that where her mother only sought to help women with their health afflictions, Nella, for reasons her own, also secretly dispenses poisons to women who request it to “remedy” the husbands, lovers, fathers, brothers, or whichever other male has crossed them.
Eliza, the maidservant of one of Nella’s clients, is a 12-year old girl who befriends Nella when sent to get poison at the bidding of her mistress, Mrs. Amwell. It’s lovely little Eliza who innocently sets in motion the events that change the lives of these three ladies.
Jump to the present day timeline, where we meet Caroline, a history buff, who’s gone on a trip to London that was meant as a ten-year anniversary gift for she and her husband, James, but through circumstance, now finds herself there solo. On a whim one day, she goes mudlarking (discovering buried treasures hidden in the river’s mud) at the River Thames where she discovers a mysterious blue vial that, unbeknownst to her, ties back to Nella and Eliza. In her efforts to find out more about this vial, the story of the past comes to life.
I won’t go into all the details of the story, because it’s better to let it tell itself, but this fascinating womens’/historical fiction shines a light on issues experienced by women, both past and present, as they deal with the implications of their place in society. In 1791, that means Nella, Eliza, and the other women of their day having almost no power to right the wrongs they’re experiencing - at least legally, and in the present day, it’s more about how women, like Caroline, often suppress or abandon their own goals in pursuit of keeping harmony in their homes.
Despite the themes, I don’t think the intention of the book is to hate on men or paint them in the light that they’re only capable of harming women in some way, nor is it to glorify women harming them in return. Rather, this story illuminates the path that these womens’ choices put them on and the overall effects those choices have on them.
I enjoyed both the past and present storylines. Nella and Eliza’s almost mother-daughter-like friendship is sweet, as is the friendship that develops between Caroline and Gaynor, a librarian at the British Library who helps her research the vial. It’s a journey of intrigue, mystery and discovery as the dual storylines unfold. Nella and Eliza’s story has palpable tension as the repercussions of their choices made on and around February 10 come to light, and in the present, it’s one of self-discovery for Caroline, as she uncovers, not only the past, but a clear path for her future. It’s a quieter, slower story. It didn’t grab me and scream in my face for attention - thank goodness - but it beckoned me into these ladies’ lives, nonetheless, and it was a lovely little journey that I recommend you take as well. Sarah Penner has offered a wonderful debut!
★★★★
Thank you to NetGalley, Harlequin - Trade Publishing and Sarah Penner for this ARC in exchange for my honest review. It will be published March 2, 2021.
Rating: really liked it
This is a Historical Fiction, but I would not call this a Historical Fantasy Fiction. I did not find any fantasy in this book, but there is a little bit of Magical Realism in this book. This book jumps from the 1700's told by Nella and Eliza point of view and current day in the point of view of Caroline. Caroline's life in coming apart, and her life runs into the story of Nella and Eliza. I have to say I loved Nella and Eliza's character and storyline. I liked Caroline storyline, but I could have done without it. I think that this book could have been so much better without jumping the time periods. I wanted to get to know Nella and Eliza character a lot more. I could not put this book down because I had to know how this story ended. The ending was so good. This book is well written, and the plot keeps you reading. I have to say I really love the cover of this book, and the cover really fits the story in every way. I just have to say I am starting to hate when they say a book is something like (Historical Fantasy), but it as no Fantasy. I also did not pick this book up because it says it is Historical Fantasy, and I do not really do Fantasy. Lucky one of my goodreads friends posted a review that said it did not have much Fantasy, so I decided to get it a chance.
I picked this book as my March 2021 book for Book of the Month
https://www.mybotm.com/zr12wnytgc8?sh...
Rating: really liked it
ConcealmentThe Lost Apothecary is a beautiful tapestry of mystery, murder, suspense, guilt, discovery, and historical adventure as it unfolds in the dark alleyways of late eighteenth-century London. With the second period in modern times, Caroline Parcewell is an American, visiting London on what was planned as her tenth wedding anniversary celebration, until she discovered her husband had an affair. Now she is using the trip to gain space to think about where her life is going and why she never followed her dreams as an aspiring historian. In a mudlarking gathering on the banks of the Thames, Caroline discovers a small bluish vial with a strange image of a bear carved into the side.
Over two hundred years earlier, Nella Clavinger, followed on with her mother’s apothecary shop and held tight to the principle
“the importance of providing a safe haven – a place of healing – for women.” There is however one major difference, Nella also makes poisons to kill men if they have betrayed a woman. All her commissions are recorded in her register, a process started by her mother. While Nella is developed as a wonderfully empathetic character, suffering physical and psychological pain, she is a serial killer known only to women. Because Nella is hard-working, caring, and vulnerable it is easy to forget that she has a very dark side without obvious remorse.
“My precious register was a record of life and death; an inventory of the many women who sought potions from here, the darkest of apothecary shops.”
One day a twelve-year-old girl, Eliza Fanning, visits the apothecary on an errand from her mistress Mrs Amwell to request a potion to kill her husband Thompson Amwell. After the deed is complete Eliza comes back to the shop while her widowed mistress embarks on travels and Eliza feels the ghosts of Mr Amwell haunt her. Eliza and Nella develop a friendship, both finding comfort in each other’s company and a way to work together. The relationship between the two is wonderful and their dialogue is engaging with a feel of historical authenticity.
Each chapter is well staged as we flip between the three POV narratives of each woman. The little blue vial becomes the seductive link between the two time periods. Caroline develops a friendship with Gaynor from the British Library, and their research opens fascinating threads that Caroline explores in the hidden and forgotten corners of London. Of surprise, Bear Alley still exists, if all but forgotten, and the web of intrigue stretches between the three women. The storytelling in Sarah Penner’s novel is clever and entertaining, engrossing with a sinister undertone, and draws that amazing atmospheric blend between modern and historical London.
I had an issue accepting the deep friendships developed after a few meetings and the thought processes with Caroline as she was caught in compromising situations. There is a tainted matter of betrayal throughout the story, mainly coming from men who pay the ultimate price. I found the following quote very telling and thoughtful, although a sad position to accept.
“First, there was trust. Then, there was betrayal. You cannot have one without the other. You cannot be betrayed by someone you do not trust.”
The Lost Apothecary is a highly enjoyable novel that flows at a great pace through two eras of London as a long-held mystery of the apothecary murders is gradually solved. I would recommend this book, and I would like to thank Legend Press and NetGalley for providing me with a free copy in return for an honest review.
Rating: really liked it
Sarah Penner's debut is an intriguing and atmospheric piece of historical fiction revolving around women, set in the tail end of the 18th century in London, a story that shifts from the past and the present. In the 1790s, a once reputable apothecary, Nella, has ventured into darker and more dangerous territory, that of dispensing poisons to desperate women in dire situations due to the men who have damaged or wronged them. She intends that no woman is harmed, and she records her transactions in a register, the names, including that of the poisoner and the victim. The young child Eliza Fanning is a sparky and bright personality who is sent to get poison, and a friendship develops between Nella and Eliza. Unsurprisingly, Nella's intentions run into difficulties when it comes to implementing them.
In the present, the American Caroline Parcewell's marriage has run into difficulties, she has made the unpalatable discovery that her husband of ten years has been unfaithful to her. She finds herself alone as she travels to London on her wedding anniversary. She decides to join a mudlarkers group in search of finds from the past in the muds of the banks of the River Thames, unearthing an old vial. This allows her to indulge her love of history as she engages in historical research and the mystery that is two centuries old, and a string of unsolved murders in her search for the truth. In this entertaining and engaging character driven read, of secrets, vengeance, betrayal, being a women, relationships between women, friendship, self discovery, poisons and murder, the past and present connect in the most unexpected of ways.
This is a relatively short and suspenseful novel from Penner, well written, which beautifully evokes the London of the time, and includes intricate historical details of the period. The position of women is a central theme, and the narrative reflects the culture and the social norms and attitudes of the time. My favourite timeline was definitely the more compelling historical one rather than the present one, there is an unevenness in how the connections unfold and in storytelling, but I liked how Caroline ends up working her way through the challenges that she faces. Many thanks to Legend Press for an ARC.
Rating: really liked it
Hurray to a fantastic debut novel to Sarah PennerThis dual timezone Historical Fiction novel was a nice change of pace and theme for me! I listened to the audiobook and the narrators definitely itched it up a notch for me!
In 1791 in London, England Nella has continued running her mother's old Apothecary. Nella has had a difficult life and now sees it as her business to help women who are treated very badly by the men in their lives - she concocts potions that helps to be rid of them forever. One day a young girl named Eliza comes calling and this is the beginning of troubled times.
Two hundred years later in present time a woman named Caroline is visiting London on what should have been a 10th wedding anniversary holiday. Instead she is alone and pondering her thoughts. While "mudlarking" along the River Thames she comes across a blue vial. She goes on a quest to find out its meaning and who it belonged to.
I was engrossed throughout the whole book. It's slower paced but meaningful and I think Sarah Penner is a promising author. I really enjoyed this unique story with strong female characters that comes to a neatly packed ending.
