Author: Lydia Kang
Publisher: Lake Union Publishing
Year: 2018
Genre(s):historical fiction, historical romance, historical mystery
Part of a Series: No
Rating:
Why I read it: A Once Upon a Book Club selection
Summary: In 19th century New York, bodies are in high demand for doctors to study and improve their medical knowledge. They are supplied by Resurrectionists (AKA graverobbers) and one of the best in the business is Jacob Lee. He and his crew are able to produce intriguing cases for the doctors and universities they sell to but he’s hiding the most intriguing case—himself.
Or rather, herself.
Jacob Lee is really Cora Lee, the bastard daughter of a disgraced socialite and a Chinese immigrant. She sometimes is herself or plays the role of Jacob, moving around New York’s medical community as she tries to survive. But when people with strange medical afflictions start dying, Cora’s job grows more dangerous as she tries to keep her big secret from coming to light—she is the legendary girl with two hearts.
Review: It took me a while to get into this book but once it picked up, it was a very intriguing read. But it just took several chapters before I was really hooked and I was just reading to get to the gifts provided by my book club.
Cora is an interesting lead character but she is a bit cocky at first, both as herself and Jacob. Of course, she is the best in the business and so some of her arrogance is earned. It’s also a front to keep herself safe from those who might learn her secret and try to harm her, but it did make it hard for me to get invested in her. I liked how much freer she felt as Jacob, that nothing fundamentally changed about her personality—she could just show it more because of how society viewed men versus women.
I wish we had seen more of her cousin Suzette though I do admit I don’t know how. She intrigued me, especially how she interacted with Cora. It would’ve been nice to see the two together a bit more rather than having it all shoved in the last third of the book. Cora had very few female relationships—with the other being with Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell. It would’ve been nice to see more from those two and explore Cora’s passion for medicine as well. I guess Ms. Kang didn’t want to focus too much on the historical character, usually keeping them to relatively minor roles if not just passing appearances.
The medical mystery and the murder mystery blended well together. Ms. Kang is also a doctor and she used her knowledge of “bizarre” medical conditions to great effect here, making the victims seem like oddities and unnatural when really there were medical explanations. It’s just no one had figured them out yet. And the murder mystery kept me guessing until the very end. It was clever twist and I almost could see it making sense, but a few clues earlier probably would’ve helped a bit too. Especially the culprit’s motivation—it wasn’t really evident as early as it probably should’ve been.
Bottom line: A slow start but it gets interesting once the mystery really kicks in.
Sex: Mentioned but nothing graphic.
Moonlight Musing
Would you dig up a dead body?
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