The Lost Apothecary by Sarah Penner
An outdated past. a female secret network. a legacy of malice and retaliation. Greetings from The Lost Apothecary… A peculiar kind of customer is served by a hidden apothecary shop in the depths of eighteenth-century London. Women in the city rumour that a strange woman by the name of Nella sells cunningly disguised poisons that they might use to get rid of the controlling males in their lives. But the apothecary’s future is in jeopardy when her newest customer, a bright 12-year-old, makes a catastrophic error, setting off a chain of events that reverberates through the ages. Aspired historian Caroline Parcewell spends her tenth wedding anniversary alone in modern-day London while evading her own problems.
The Lost Apothecary by Sarah Penner
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Her life collides with the apothecary in a surprising turn of events, and not everyone will survive when she discovers a link to the unsolved apothecary murders that plagued London 200 years ago. The Lost Apothecary is a subversive and enthralling debut novel of secrets, retribution, and the surprising ways women can save each other despite the passage of time. It has crackling tension, unique characters, and searing insight. The London Seance Society is a must-see! The second mesmerizing novel by Sarah explores the serious risks that women are willing to take in order to exact revenge on the people they love.
This is a narrative about the courage to discover what a person’s potential real-life journey might be, despite being a very tragic one. There may be a period of great dissatisfaction when women prioritize their husbands over themselves in their life path. Unknowingly, many young women have abandoned their own goals in favour of having children and pursuing their spouses’ ambitions. After some time, many women discover that their husbands’ interests do not align with their own. Why women put their own interests and need last can make for an interesting study in history.
Caroline, an American, travels alone to London on a scheduled ten-year anniversary trip after discovering her husband cheating on her with a coworker in the late 1700s. She joins Nella, the herbalist, who is working in her line of business in London, England. Caroline is forced to examine the course her life has taken by her anger, grief, and confusion over her husband’s infidelity. She begins to wonder if there is anything else she can do to further her interests outside of marriage, children, and trying to fit into the roles that help her husband achieve his goals. While strolling across London, she muses about her love of British history, her fascination with Victorian authors and their works, and her unrealized desire of attending Cambridge.
Caroline is encouraged to try mud larking, a tourist practice that involves scrounging around on the Thames when the tide goes out in search of peculiar, historic, or precious items left behind by the water, as she strolls. As it happens, Caroline does discover something unusual and sets off on a quest to learn more about it, its history, and the people connected to it. Along the way, she rekindles her love of history, study, and herself.
Bright spots were offered by Alfred, the mud larking tour guide, and Gaynor, his research librarian daughter; they also gave Caroline the assistance she needed to learn the mysteries of Nella’s universe. The tension between Caroline and her husband James is realistic and effective in moving the plot along. You want to read the book through to the finish because of the clever twist involving the mid-story events and how they relate to Nella’s plot.
