It is no secret that I have a particular interest in the history of the early modern period in England, which has the fascinating – to me, at least – intersection of old herbalist practices, folk healing, and alchemy with what were the beginnings of what became modern medicine, of folk understandings of the natural world with natural philosophy and later natural history.
It is not a common occurrence to see a work of fiction cited in this publication. I have nothing against it, mind you; one of my academic degrees is in English literature. It’s simply that I don’t often happen upon novels that are both well written and whose authors are well-versed in natural history, the history of science (including medicine), or a similarly related field of study.