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Post by Deleted on Jan 18, 2022 10:17:43 GMT -5
I’m in the three star rating along with bernelli, ermabom and bumblebuzz21. I agree with the remarks about how unbelievable some of the story line is. I also thought there were opportunities for making a real connection between Nella/Eliza and current day Caroline. I kept thinking, oh, there’s going to be some sort of retribution payback where stumbling on the apothecary causes Caroline to be immersed in a “poisoning event out of her control”. James poisoning was the perfect way to weave this element into the story but then…..nothing. Could Caroline, the researcher stumble on a family connection to Nella/Eliza, and realize that she has the bloodline and a struggle to eliminate James/his lover ensues? Then at the very end, Nella/Eliza show themselves on the beach. Or did they? Now? Now, you write in a connection and the book ends? All of the characters seemed so weak to me. Especially, James. Sheesh! It really made me angry when he showed up in London. I think I was married to James a long time ago. Arrogant, womanizing, chickenshit! Nella was murdering people at the whim of other women.. But, on her off hours she just couldn’t get over the hurt of Frederick. When Eliza showed up, I felt like she would work against Nella and Nella would have to try to stop her. But, no, Eliza just screwed up by picking the wrong bottle and regretting it. All that said, I think it held my interest. More for what I thought would happen rather than what did happen. So, 3. Just 3.
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Post by peacemama on Jan 18, 2022 10:33:08 GMT -5
I'll share my full star review later tonight, but I agree with critics who describe the plot as a Da Vinci Code or Julie and Julia knockoff.
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Post by juliajones54 on Jan 18, 2022 10:56:26 GMT -5
I posted my Goodreads review, and initially gave the book 2 stars because of the current-day story and all the things about it that just downright pissed me off.... - the main issue being that the husband intentionally swallowed something poisonous/toxic to "get her attention" or to manipulate her feelings. That's total bullshit. I didn't buy that for a second (and, people, I just bought a weighted hula hoop I saw on TikTok...I am an EASY sell). I'm so mad that the author thought we'd buy that BS. I mean. Seriously. Us readers have brains. - Also, her immediate acceptance into Cambridge after being out of college for 5-8 yrs? I can suspend belief plenty, but that was too big of an assumption/leap - Caroline solved a 200+ year old mystery within just a few days of her visit to the UK. Again I wave my Bullshit sign. BUT then I kept thinking about how much I did love the 1700's characters and the apothecary's story...so I went back and upped my rating to a 3 based on the olde medicine shoppe story. Exactly, so much BS and unbelievable scenarios. The modern day story was totally unnecessary. Why, when the story of an Apothecary in the 1700's and the fascinating characters that could have been developed... such a missed opportunity. I did give it 3 stars on Goodreads solely for that part of the novel. I said in my review maybe another author could take this idea and truly do justice to it.
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Post by fitin14 on Jan 18, 2022 11:04:10 GMT -5
I am giving it a 3 star rating. I liked it and read it quickly without feeling 'forced' to get through it but I would have liked a bit more detail in the mystery solving and in the 'what happened to' on the characters at the end.
I liked the jumping from one century to another, when done well this doesn't bother me.
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Post by gemster on Jan 18, 2022 12:13:21 GMT -5
3 stars from me too, I loved the 1700s story but also found the modern day bit/Caroline uninteresting, unrealistic and unnecessary, it could have been great without that. I always have this gripe when American authors write about England but the majority of them have such an unrealistic view of what it’s like to live/work/study in a big city like London and how crazy expensive it is!! I feel like a lot of US authors watch Love Actually or Notting Hill and base their characters/story on that. Interesting that someone said they didn’t feel Caroline spoke like an American as I felt the book had a very American tone - even some of the 1700s dialogue
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Post by ermabom on Jan 18, 2022 12:34:58 GMT -5
On the subject of poisoning, I read one of her cited resources last week after I read this book. It is called The Secret Poisoner and I found it fascinating. It covers poisoning cases and the science that slowly developed to identify poisons in the 19th century and into the first few decades of the 20th century. Apparently arsenic poisoning was relatively common because it was so easy to obtain and that was the first poison for which a test was developed. Most mineral poisons came after but the organic ones - e.g. morphine - was much harder.
Just fyi. I found that more interesting that the fiction.
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Post by zoomingzebra on Jan 18, 2022 13:18:29 GMT -5
I gave it a 5 on Goodreads. Could probably be a 4 though. I found the writing between the two separate stories so different! When telling the apothecary story the writing was just better. So strange. I really liked the book though and found myself wanting to finish so I gave it a high rating. 🤷♀️
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sal
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Post by sal on Jan 18, 2022 14:44:31 GMT -5
I gave it a 5 solely based on the 1700s story, which pharmacist me loved. You're all right about the lameness of a lot of the modern part, but I think I blocked that out on my read. Ha!
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Post by ccToast on Jan 18, 2022 15:56:45 GMT -5
I give it a 4. I agree with most of you that the plot from the 1700s was interesting but that too much of the story was unbelievable: immediate acceptance to Cambridge and the shop being hidden for so long at the top of the list.
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Post by peacemama on Jan 19, 2022 4:01:46 GMT -5
I wish there were half star options on Goodreads. This is one of those books I would have rated a 3.5. Since I round up, I'd award it 4 stars.
Interesting 1700s plot that could have really sang on its own. However, without the present day storyline it wouldn't have been The "Lost" Apothecary. Solid debut novel by Penner.
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Post by peacemama on Jan 19, 2022 4:42:43 GMT -5
Wednesday
"The worth of a book is to be measured by what you can carry away from it.” – James Bryce
Regardless of star rating, I believe that books offer the reader the opportunity to reflect and grow. Sometimes the growth is rooted in new learning, such as a nugget of knowledge gleaned about a location, period in history, or simply ourselves. Books open our minds to new possibilities, thoughts, or interests. They help us connect to the world around us and enrich our lives.
What was a new take away you discovered by reading The Lost Apothecary? What lingers with you? Any new tidbits of knowledge? Anything spark your interest or make you wonder?
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Post by gemster on Jan 19, 2022 5:40:32 GMT -5
I knew very little about apothecaries, poisons etc so I did learn a lot from this book and it’s definitely something I’m interested in, the book ermabom suggested is expensive over here but I want to read it when the kindle copy comes down in price plus I’ve added a few others to my wishlist about real life poisoners. I’ve also learnt (or more likely reminded myself!) that my geographical knowledge of London is pretty much non existent back in the day I used to go down fairly regularly for work but I never got my head round where anything was in relation to anything else.
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Post by moosishun on Jan 19, 2022 6:24:37 GMT -5
I came out with even more admiration for librarians!
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Post by moosishun on Jan 19, 2022 6:28:34 GMT -5
And about yesterday's question (yes, I am going back) - I didn't mind Caroline's role in this book. I was okay with all the plot twists. Stranger things have happened than her soon-to-be-ex. In this day of computers, getting knowledge quick is part of the lure of the internet, so I didn't mind the breaking of the story so quickly, plus she had a LIBRARIAN as a friend and those people are formidable.
I'm just mad that she didn't hold onto that apothecary and get to meet those fantastic women. Come on, Sarah!! That was such a nothing move!
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Post by ccToast on Jan 19, 2022 7:29:08 GMT -5
I had never heard of mudlarking before, and now I want to do it! Did you all see Sarah Penner's video about that? Mudlarking on the River Thames! I always appreciate stories where women find and assert their power. Nella, Eliza and Caroline were all at different points of finding/knowing who they are, and I cheered Eliza and Caroline as they discovered that they could take action and not just react/accept what the men in their lives expected.
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Post by bumblebuzz21 on Jan 19, 2022 8:17:18 GMT -5
I learned that I have zero desire to be digging around in the mud in a giant river.
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Post by ermabom on Jan 19, 2022 8:49:56 GMT -5
Having a friend as a librarian is great and very useful. drinking eucalyptus oil is something to be avoided. Keeping a book of who you sold poisons to is bad business practice, as is putting a unique symbol on your vials if you are selling poison. Also selling poisons is a lonely activity if you want to avoid getting caught. I felt very sorry for Nella - how lonely she was due to her isolation.
I was surprised by how easy a time Eliza had as a maid. From some of the other books I've read, these were not pleasant jobs. She had a room to herself and when her mistress was out of town, she didn't seem to have other chores assigned to her. I would have expected that.
And yes, I wouldn't enjoy mudkarjubg
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Post by bernelli on Jan 19, 2022 9:08:37 GMT -5
Wednesday"The worth of a book is to be measured by what you can carry away from it.” – James Bryce I absolutely love this quote -- thanks for sharing this! And it's so true for me... there are times when I post my Goodreads review, then find I'm still thinking about the book 3 days later and just based on that, even if my review was low-stars, I have to go back and update the rating. If an author puts out a book that evokes so much emotion & mental processing that I'm still thinking about the story days later, then my initial review is worthy of an upgrade, for sure. Even if I didn't like the book or completely disagreed with the concepts in it...the author got something right by making me think and think and think. Love.This.Quote! Things I learned/took away: - Mudlarking -- I also did not know what that was and had never heard of it - Eliza's situation, and how she came to write for her mistress (I forget her name). That was interesting. I do think the other houseworkers were probably jealous...did they bully her as I suspect they would? I wanted to know more about that. - The overall 1700's cultural descriptions (clothes, stores, muddy roads, societal hierarchy) -- I love reading about that and trying to get some perception of the reality of that era. I thought it was sad that Eliza didn't have a woman helping her through this age of her life and getting her first period. As a rambling thought, I don't think that attitude was due to the era because in the '70's when I was staying with my grandmother for the summer and got my first one, she never tried to educate me at all... I went back home at the end of that summer and my mother had to retrain me after learning that I had no clue how to take care of myself. I can only imagine how much worse this situation was in the 1700's.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 19, 2022 9:31:48 GMT -5
There’s two things that I feel like I will, most likely, look up and do a little research on. Mudlarking and just how commonly poison was used to murder, in this time period. bernelli, I agree. I kept thinking how awful to think you were going to die from your period. But, I also thought that was a missed opportunity in the story. If I’m going to die, anyway, and I’m involved in a poisoning operation, how would that change my behavior? I agree with whoever said it would be interesting to see what another author could do with this story. As a total sidebar, I finished up making candied ginger this morning. So, if I ran a lost apothecary, I’d most likely “kill them with kindness”.
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Post by zoomingzebra on Jan 19, 2022 10:20:53 GMT -5
I had also never heard of mudlarking and now I want to do it! I followed the person she recommended on Instagram, and a few others through her, and it is fascinating to see what they pull out of the riverbed.
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Post by fitin14 on Jan 19, 2022 11:07:03 GMT -5
I am a sucker for a good woman rising above her lackluster life and fulfilling herself tale and this part did not disappoint with Caroline. Especially with her husband taking the medicine internally on purpose for attention... huge red flag girl you run LMAO
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Post by juliajones54 on Jan 19, 2022 14:41:07 GMT -5
On the subject of poisoning, I read one of her cited resources last week after I read this book. It is called The Secret Poisoner and I found it fascinating. It covers poisoning cases and the science that slowly developed to identify poisons in the 19th century and into the first few decades of the 20th century. Apparently arsenic poisoning was relatively common because it was so easy to obtain and that was the first poison for which a test was developed. Most mineral poisons came after but the organic ones - e.g. morphine - was much harder. Just fyi. I found that more interesting that the fiction. Thank you for mentioning this book, I found it on the library app Hoopla and just checked it out. The Lost Apothecary has definitely opened the door to more learning about something I did not know a lot about.
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Post by corgi on Jan 19, 2022 21:49:13 GMT -5
Hi! Just finished the book. I've read through the comments and tried to comment on a few. I found this book to be quite the "can't put it down" story, and yet, I can't rate it very highly. Maybe it was because Caroline's constant whining about a baby got on my nerves, or maybe it was how she stumbled across a secret room no one had seen in 200 years within a day of landing in the UK, or just how much of a caricature James was, but it had major problems.
I had coffee with a friend today and said I think I was intrigued by the subject matter, a woman poisoning men as kind of a heroic vigilante character, but thought maybe someone else could've written a much better tale.
And being an Audible user, I still haven't seen the book. Though I definitely always buy wine based on the label!
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Post by honeybzzzs on Jan 19, 2022 23:20:54 GMT -5
Mudlarking was new to me. Thank you ccToast for posting that link. It gave me the push to do some googling. Interesting what people find—from pottery bits to human skeletons. Interesting hobby! Am I the only one that has recipes for poisoning in the last pages of the book? Also, this paragraph was interesting. “…throughout England in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the largest population of accused poisoners consisted of mothers, wives and female servants, between the ages of twenty and twenty-nine. Motives ranged widely: grudges against employers, the removal of inconvenient spouses or lovers, death benefits or the inability to financially support a child” During my reading of this book, I got the impression that poison was the secret side business. She ran a reputable shop otherwise. Thus, I didn’t find it odd that there was a logo on her bottles. Most of those would have held non-poisonous product.
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Post by sparkles on Jan 20, 2022 0:22:39 GMT -5
Wednesday"The worth of a book is to be measured by what you can carry away from it.” – James Bryce Regardless of star rating, I believe that books offer the reader the opportunity to reflect and grow. Sometimes the growth is rooted in new learning, such as a nugget of knowledge gleaned about a location, period in history, or simply ourselves. Books open our minds to new possibilities, thoughts, or interests. They help us connect to the world around us and enrich our lives. What was a new take away you discovered by reading The Lost Apothecary? What lingers with you? Any new tidbits of knowledge? Anything spark your interest or make you wonder? peacemama, I love that quote! I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I read it through the lens of powerless women finding a way to empower themselves.
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