About this book:
“Travel
writer Amelia Balfour’s dream of touring Egypt is halted when she receives news
of a revolutionary new surgery for her grotesquely disfigured brother. This could
change everything, and it does. . .in the worst possible way.
Surgeon Graham Lambert has
suspicions about the doctor he’s gone into practice with, but he can’t stop him
from operating on Amelia’s brother. Will he be too late to prevent the man’s death?
Or to reveal his true feelings for Amelia before she sails to Cairo?”
Series: As of now, no. A stand-alone novel.
Spiritual Content- Scriptures are read, quoted, & thoughts over; Bible
reading; Prayers; Talks about God, Him being with us, & His plans; ‘H’s are
capitalized when referring to God; When something good happens, Amelia says
that she was finally good enough for God to notice (this could be stemming from
her not thinking her earthly father cared for her); Amelia crosses herself when
thinking of someone that passed; Amelia reads a psalter in the beginning of the
book and after having more questions that solace, she stops reading for the
day; Going to church (Amelia) & hearing a Scripture in a sermon; Graham
says he’s not certain that God would welcome a heathen such as himself to
church (Amelia replies that a true heathen would not acknowledge a God who may
or may not welcome him); Mentions of God; Mentions of Bibles, devotions, &
reading them both; Mentions of churches/chapels, church going, vicars, &
sermons; Mentions of Heaven; Mentions of miracles & miracle workers; Mentions
of saints & women being called a saint because of their personalities; A few
mentions of those in the Bible; A few mentions of prayers & praying; A few
mentions of blessings & seeking blessings before traveling; A few mentions
of sins & sinners; A mention of Godspeed; A mention of a blessing over
food; A mention of a woman’s glower that could make a saint cower behind a
crucifix; A mention of Eve and the snake; A mention of a child being named
Sodom by a master (and that the boy had been groomed to do as he was told and
that only God knew what it was);
*Note: Graham says that it is God
who numbers a man’s days and that a surgeon is not God, but when Mr. Peckwood asks
if Graham if he’s a religious fellow, he says he is not, and Mr. Peckwood says
religion never helped him (the conversation started with Mr. Peckwood says that
a successful doctor instills confidence in the surgeon rather than allowing the
patient a “tenuous hope in an invisible unknown”); Mr. Peckwood said he begged
God to help someone and that He didn’t; Peckwood plays God with the patients at
the asylum; ; Amelia is superstitious and carries around a lucky feather she
calls a talisman (she also tosses spilled salt over her shoulder, mentions the
thought that when a gathering of ravens is seen that portends death, and a
couple other ones, but *Spoiler* she gives it all up at the end and asks God
for forgiveness *End of Spoiler*); Colin sees phantoms after the treatments
start & hopes they go back to whatever hell they came from; Mentions of ghosts,
haunting tales, people saying a place is haunted, & an area with a ghoulish
history; A few mentions of luck, bad luck, & folklore; A couple mentions of
a man being called the devil & a contact with him; A couple mentions of people
having a demon in their eyes; A mention of someone escaping their demons; A mention
of roaring like a demon; A mention of an injury hurting like the devil’s fire; A
mention of devilish torment; A mention of an animal being sneaky devils; A mention
of a man’s devil-may-care hair length; A mention of doing something or there
will be the devil to pay; A mention of Amelia saying that if houses had souls,
her childhood home would be bound for Hades; A mention of if there was a portal
to hell, a certain place would be it; A mention of someone running like a hound
of hell; A mention of a godforsaken path; A mention of another country with veiled
ladies with their turbaned sheikhs; Phrases like “God knows”, “Thank God”, and “pray
God” are said by those who believe in God & others who they (and the
readers) aren’t sure about their beliefs; Other phrases are exclaimed: three forms of “sweet, Blessed Saviour/sweet
blessed mercy!’ and seven forms of ‘sweet mercy/sweet heavens!’; “Great God!”
is exclaimed in a quote from “Frankenstein”.
Negative Content- Minor cussing including: (if you’re unfamiliar or unsure how
one of these was used, most were exclamations and are noted because in today’s
society, minor cussing or cursing would take its place) a ‘botheration!’, a ‘criminy’,
an ‘egads!’, a ‘lawks-a-mercy’, a ‘scads!’, a form of ‘stupid’, two ‘claptrap’s
(‘what a load of claptrap’), two forms of ‘hang it all/snag it all’s, two forms
of ‘oh, my stars!/by the stars’, two ‘what
the deuce’s, three ‘mercy!’s, four forms of ‘dashed/dash it’, four ‘thunderation!’s, five
forms of ‘pish-posh’, five forms of ‘bah/pah’, seven forms of ‘blast/blast it’,
and nine forms of ‘what the devil’; Other phrases such as a ‘grimmety grouse!’,
‘to the dogs with…’, ‘curse *name* and their ideas’, ‘thunder and turf!’, ‘rot
and bother!’, and ‘queen and country!’; Stopping a curse from leaving your mouth
(Colin, once); Mentions of curses (said, not written); A bit of eye rolling; Pain,
blood/bleeding, & injuries (up to semi-detailed); Being choked, drugged, hit,
& injured (up to semi-detailed); Doctor actions such as giving stitches, taking
care of blood and injuries, and seeing dead bodies (up to semi-detailed); Seeing
people hit & bleeding (up to semi-detailed); *Major Spoiler* Colin and Mr.
Peckwood go over a cliff and die, we see this in Amelia and Graham’s point of
views, up to semi-detailed *End of Spoiler*; Being shot at (when someone says
they saw a monster, but it was Colin); Seeing a child hit & almost run over;
Seeing a bird hit a widow & thinking it’s dead; Social drinking; Many mentions
of dead bodies, blood/bleeding, infections, injuries (including ones so bad you
can see the bone or the muscle), seeing people pass out, & pain (up to semi-detailed):
Mentions of grave robbers & those who hire them to steal bodies for
dissection; Mentions of jars filled with different colored liquids and body parts;
Mentions of a fence with glass at the top & someone harming themself and
bleeding (up to semi-detailed); Mentions of rifles & shooting at someone; Mentions
of alcohol, taverns, drinking, & drunks; Mentions of cigars/cheroots, pipes,
tobacco, & smoking; Mentions of a snuff box (an older women says it’s God
she’ll have to answer for and she’s fully prepare to “explain to [her] Maker
how [she] never read one verse of scripture forbidding a hefty pinch of snuff”);
Mentions of lies, lying, & liars; Mentions of gossip & rumors; A few
mentions of trying to find two bodies in the water (barely-above-not-detailed);A
few mentions of fighting, fights, being beaten, & hitting someone; A few
mentions of burns from a child pulling down a pot of boiling water; A few
mentions of bloodletting; A couple mentions of being accused as a thief &
being beaten for it; A couple mentions of jealousy; A couple mentions of hunting;
A mention of someone being lost at sea; A mention of mutilated bodies; A mention
of someone making rat poison; A mention of not being a wagering man; A mention
of human waste;
*Note: Each chapter starts with a
quote from the classic book, “Frankenstein”; Amelia warns her maid about
her brother’s deformity (at first she wonders should he say that he’s a monster
or a freak of nature, but tells the maid that he suffers from a disease that
causes uncontrollable and abnormal growth along with suffering a horrible burn
to his face); Some people cry and scream when they see Colin; A couple mentions
of a “dog-faced maid”.
Sexual Content- Two (barely-above-not-detailed)
hand kisses, a forehead kiss, an almost kiss, two barely-above-not-detailed kisses,
and a very detailed kiss; Recalling a kiss (semi-detailed); Wanting to kiss
& touch/embrace; Touches, Embraces, Warmth, Nearness, Jolts/Tingles, & Smelling
(semi-detailed); Blushes & Winks; Noticing & Staring (including curves
and a man’s chest hair and muscles, up to semi-detailed); Husky voices; Amelia
tells Graham a story about two young lovers who were married in secret and according
to a rumor, shared their love over in a thicket of trees (she apologizes that
she got carried away in the story, but Graham thinks that he’s surprisingly honored
that she would share with him an intimate reference); Graham removes his cravat,
Amelia can’t look away and stares at his chest hair peeking out; Mr. Peckwood does
animal magnetism (hypnotism) on a woman, but it includes him outline the shape
of her body with his hand, Amelia thinks that it’s too intimate and too indecent
to be doing in public, though when she believes that it worked on the woman,
Graham tries to explain that it isn’t real, attempts to do it on her, and they
end up kissing; Graham is a doctor and sees Amelia’s barefoot (which she didn’t
want to do because of propriety, but did due to an injury); When Graham is
brought up in a conversation or he does something slightly scandalous, flirty,
or looks handsome, Amelia gets hot, fans herself, and wonders why it’s so hot
in the room; Mentions of a woman that was brutally abused (implied sexually); Mentions
of kisses & kissing; Mentions of chaperones; A few mentions of a scandalous
pair living together & being unsure if they are married; A few mentions of trollops;
A few mentions of flirts; A few mentions of winks; A mention of a ship’s crew
going ashore for women and rum; A mention of jealousy; Love, falling in love,
& the emotions;
*Note: When an unmarried woman says
she’s pregnant, Amelia wonders if she should offer congratulations or
condolences, but says she looks forward to meeting the little one someday; A few
mentions of a women’s feminine curves; A mention of ill breeding; Graham says
that “other than a passing glance at a well-curved skirt”, he didn’t dwell on
females; The Historical Notes at the end of the book mentions Mary Shelley
(author of “Frankenstein”), her baby’s death (born prematurely), her
lover having an affair, and another baby being conceived out-of-wedlock.
-Amelia Balfour, age 27
-Graham Lambert
P.O.V.
switches between them & Colin
Set
in 1815 (Final chapter set in 1816)
320 pages
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Pre
Teens- 
New
Teens- 
Early
High School Teens- 
Older
High School Teens- 
My
personal Rating- 
{Not for
those sensitive to death or have recently lost a loved one.}
After reading “The Thief of Blackfriars Lane” by this author and mostly enjoying it, I decided to look more into her other books. I read “The House at the End of the Moor” in the last few months and was so enthralled with the plotline, I gave it four stars.
So, I had decently high hopes for this book.
I think the major parts that affected my ratings were certain comments (such as Amelia noticing Graham’s chest hair when he removes his cravat and then her telling him a story about a couple being intimate together in a thicket of trees), but also that the last 40% of this book I was so Stressed. Yes, with a capital ‘S’. Very, incredibly stressed about how this book was going to end. And I have to say that I’m not a fan of how it ended. Some may like it, and while the faith content at the end made it a bit better, I’m coming away from this book sniffling and more than a bit sad. (Which apparently Frankenstein and stories inspired by that famous book are all typically sad. I did not know this and will be avoiding such topics from now on. Meanwhile my heart is ☹ )
It was heartbreaking in many regards, but mainly in Colin, Amelia’s younger brother, and how he is treated because he has a rare form of acromegalia as well as severe burns. We see his point of view and he was truly the only one I really liked in this story (more on that in a minute). He his called a monster by many and has lived secluded, not seeing anyone. It truly broke my heart to see the fear others had for him and the name-calling he was subject to. While it can be true for many in his shoes, I hate that happening so much. He is the only reason I’m giving this book two stars because I liked him as a character and found him to be the best one in it.
I had a really hard time connecting to Amelia and Graham, but mostly her. I found her to be somewhat selfish and she never endured herself to me. Graham’s faith content was interesting in this book, but again, overall, I never really liked him either. He never went with his any of the feelings in his gut on Mr. Peckwood and that bothered me a lot. Maybe I just have trust issues, but I would hope I wouldn’t be so hung up on someone’s accomplishments and avoiding the warning signs of something being wrong. (Hello, Graham, the wad of cotton?! And you’re still trusting this wack-a-doodle?!)
The book had a very melancholy and almost depressing feel, which isn’t helping my thoughts on it. I like my fiction books to end where everyone is happy and justice is served. This wouldn’t be a book for those sensitive to death or someone who recently lost a loved one. It’s pretty sad and while the faith content shown helps some, it was still a hard book for me to read.
See y’all on Friday with a new
review!
*BFCG may (Read the review to see) recommend this book by this
author. It does not mean I recommend all the books by this author.
*I received this book for free
from the Publisher (Barbour) for this honest review.
