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kamero's review against another edition
3.0
This book took me a long time to get through. The writer’s style just maybe isn’t for me. The concept was so intriguing and I really wanted to know how it ended. The last 50-100 pages were probably the best of the entire book. I kind of wish the first 2/3 of the book were condensed, and we got to hear way more after the point where book ended.
beastreader's review against another edition
2.0
I am majorly bummed but this book. I was thoroughly looking forward to reading this book. I can barely remember anything that happened in this book. I was really just going through the motions. Yet, I still had held hope for this book until about a third of the way in then I was just sad but still I tried to stick with the book. The world that the author built was great. In fact, this really could have been a great book if the beginning had not seemed so drawn out and the characters had more life to them.
hexagong's review against another edition
3.0
Entertaining and fun. Not too out there to follow, the plot was cohesive (if at times somewhat predictable). Playful but not very "junior section" feeling.
usbsticky's review against another edition
1.0
1 star = I did not like it per GR's rating system.
The Victorian writing style just put me off and I could never get into the book. It wasn't just that as I've enjoyed all the Sherlock Holmes' shorts and other writing set in that era, I thought the writing was stiff and unnatural. I really had to concentrate to follow the book and it wasn't enjoyable at all.
I recieved this book as a free review copy.
The Victorian writing style just put me off and I could never get into the book. It wasn't just that as I've enjoyed all the Sherlock Holmes' shorts and other writing set in that era, I thought the writing was stiff and unnatural. I really had to concentrate to follow the book and it wasn't enjoyable at all.
I recieved this book as a free review copy.
canadianbookworm's review
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
https://cdnbookworm.blogspot.com/2022/01/the-apothecarys-curse.html
musicaltati's review against another edition
4.0
I was absolutely surprised by this book! A good blend of science fiction & fantasy that I started out thinking I wasn't going to really enjoy, and ended up really liking! Spanning numerous centuries I found myself, in the beginning, detached from the present-day happenings & wishing the book spent more time in the 19th century, but as the story progressed I liked how the centuries fit together in Gaelan's story.
Medicine is poison.
Full review will be uploaded to my YT channel shortly. This was my first NetGalley read, simply to try the experience. I look forward to more enjoyable reads like this one.
Medicine is poison.
Full review will be uploaded to my YT channel shortly. This was my first NetGalley read, simply to try the experience. I look forward to more enjoyable reads like this one.
ciannareider's review against another edition
4.0
I am new to Barbara Barnett but I enjoyed this book. Basically, you had me at the word Apothecary cause I am always interested in magic and witchy things, but having this book set in Victorian London, just makes it even better. I enjoyed reading this book, but it did start slow, but I promise it's worth keeping on and reading more because the mix of history, and fantasy and even science elements in this novel really make it something special, and really give you that escape you're looking for in a novel. Simon Bell and Gaelan Erceldoune are really well-written characters, with good depth of story, and I really felt like they popped off the page while reading. Don't miss this book, if you like historical fiction with fantasy elements because it is just great!
cindyc's review against another edition
3.0
The Apothecary’s Curse definitely has an interesting premise and I was captivated throughout the majority of the book. However, the last part of the book, especially the part that is set in the present didn’t quite feel as good as the rest of the book.
A book presumably written by one of the fair folk has been gifted centuries ago to a mortal man in Scotland to pass on from generation to generation, hoping it would do some good in the world. It is a book that needs to be understood completely to work. It is full of recipes for different sorts of medicine, curing all kinds of diseases like the plague and cancer. However, one little mistake can turn it into the most deadly poison, or an elixir for eternal life.
Gaelen Ercledoune was born in the 1600s and when he became ill with the plague he consulted the book his father had left him and made himself a potion, hoping it would cure him. His father had been captured and killed on claims of using sorcery before he could explain the book to his son, so in making the potion, Gaelen didn’t quite get it right and as a side effect became immortal.
In the 1800s he is an apothecary looking after the less wealthy (and sometimes even the elite when they have certain problems that a respected physician can’t see). He befriends the physician Simon Bell and when Simon’s wife is diagnosed with terminal breast cancer, he turns to Gaelen as a last resort, desperate to save the life of his one true love. Gaelen decides to help and gets out the book that helped cure him all those years ago. He has to get it just right this time though, but after much contemplation he’s willing to risk it.
Simon’s wife, though cured from the cancer, dies anyway and in his grief and desperation Simon drinks the rest of the potion Gaelen made. But contrary to his wishes, he doesn’t die… In the meantime Gaelen is arrested for a murder he didn’t commit and is transported to Bedlam where he falls under the mercy of the mad doctor, who is fascinated by the fact that wounds on Gaelen’s body seem to heal almost instantly.
A big part of the book also takes place in the present day, where Gaelen and Simon are still friends, though both plagued by the long life they have lived. Simons wants nothing more than to die and Gaelen wants to get rid of the nightmares that keep him awake every night. They have been trying to find the Ourobouros book for years now, with no success.
It is a fascinating and magical story, however in this book it all gets a more realistic and bitter twist. Immortality, alchemy, the Fair Folk, it all sounds amazing. Getting a perspective on life from someone who has lived 200 and 400 years respectively during the timeperiods that are discussed in the book is always fascinating. The good thing about this rendition is that it’s not all about magic of living forever and getting the most out of the extra time you are being gifted with.
Vampires, for example, were at some point glamorous and their immortality certainly had a great deal to do with that. Gaelen however is plagued by his immortality because of all too real problems: how can you ever succumb to love when you know that person will die while you still look the same as the moment you first met. You’ll outlive your children, your grandchildren, their grandchildren. Immortality is a lonely thing. To avoid being discovered, the immortal person has to restart their lives time and time again. One misstep though and suddenly you’re being probed and tested because of your miraculous ability to heal. Be it in the 1800’s or 2016, it’s not a cakewalk. Definitely no glamour here. Which shows that this book gives a truly realistic view on what immortality could mean for humankind.
I love how the emphasis was strongly put on the fact that the ourobouros book was specifically meant for healing and that the immortality was purely a side-effect from misinterpreting or not fully understanding the recipe for the potion. Though it is described as a book about alchemy, it is in its essence really not. It’s interesting to suggest that ages ago, some form of medicine and understanding of genetics and medical science was on par with or even surpassing what we have now, but for some reason got erased from history. Is it so crazy to see this as a possibility though? We have proof that ancient societies might have had an understanding about certain things that baffle us today. I couldn’t help to think about all these things while reading The Apothecary’s Curse.
Why did the last part of the book disappoint then in my opinion? It’s difficult to put words to feelings sometimes. I think it was mainly because of the romantic part in the present time. I had some trouble getting in to their sudden attraction, even though a possible explanation was given for this. I’m not the kind of person to like insta-love, even though it has definitely been very popular in YA the last few years. When the words “love” and “darling” were then thrown around, my brain just went ‘nope’. You’ve known each other for what, a week? Less than that? I seem to stumble over romantic aspects of the books I read often. Am I not a romantic person? Don’t I like lovey-dovey tales? Believe me, I do. To use the popular terminology: I ship certain fictional couples so hard I wish they were real. Or I was one of them. Why is it then that most of the time books can’t seem to get it right for me? Is it all going too fast in standalone books? Too sappy? Too unrealistic? I hope to find out some day.
Don’t be fooled though, I very much enjoyed the book overall. It was interesting, thought-provoking and well written. I’m looking forward to reading more of Barbara Barnett’s work.
A book presumably written by one of the fair folk has been gifted centuries ago to a mortal man in Scotland to pass on from generation to generation, hoping it would do some good in the world. It is a book that needs to be understood completely to work. It is full of recipes for different sorts of medicine, curing all kinds of diseases like the plague and cancer. However, one little mistake can turn it into the most deadly poison, or an elixir for eternal life.
Gaelen Ercledoune was born in the 1600s and when he became ill with the plague he consulted the book his father had left him and made himself a potion, hoping it would cure him. His father had been captured and killed on claims of using sorcery before he could explain the book to his son, so in making the potion, Gaelen didn’t quite get it right and as a side effect became immortal.
In the 1800s he is an apothecary looking after the less wealthy (and sometimes even the elite when they have certain problems that a respected physician can’t see). He befriends the physician Simon Bell and when Simon’s wife is diagnosed with terminal breast cancer, he turns to Gaelen as a last resort, desperate to save the life of his one true love. Gaelen decides to help and gets out the book that helped cure him all those years ago. He has to get it just right this time though, but after much contemplation he’s willing to risk it.
Simon’s wife, though cured from the cancer, dies anyway and in his grief and desperation Simon drinks the rest of the potion Gaelen made. But contrary to his wishes, he doesn’t die… In the meantime Gaelen is arrested for a murder he didn’t commit and is transported to Bedlam where he falls under the mercy of the mad doctor, who is fascinated by the fact that wounds on Gaelen’s body seem to heal almost instantly.
A big part of the book also takes place in the present day, where Gaelen and Simon are still friends, though both plagued by the long life they have lived. Simons wants nothing more than to die and Gaelen wants to get rid of the nightmares that keep him awake every night. They have been trying to find the Ourobouros book for years now, with no success.
It is a fascinating and magical story, however in this book it all gets a more realistic and bitter twist. Immortality, alchemy, the Fair Folk, it all sounds amazing. Getting a perspective on life from someone who has lived 200 and 400 years respectively during the timeperiods that are discussed in the book is always fascinating. The good thing about this rendition is that it’s not all about magic of living forever and getting the most out of the extra time you are being gifted with.
Vampires, for example, were at some point glamorous and their immortality certainly had a great deal to do with that. Gaelen however is plagued by his immortality because of all too real problems: how can you ever succumb to love when you know that person will die while you still look the same as the moment you first met. You’ll outlive your children, your grandchildren, their grandchildren. Immortality is a lonely thing. To avoid being discovered, the immortal person has to restart their lives time and time again. One misstep though and suddenly you’re being probed and tested because of your miraculous ability to heal. Be it in the 1800’s or 2016, it’s not a cakewalk. Definitely no glamour here. Which shows that this book gives a truly realistic view on what immortality could mean for humankind.
I love how the emphasis was strongly put on the fact that the ourobouros book was specifically meant for healing and that the immortality was purely a side-effect from misinterpreting or not fully understanding the recipe for the potion. Though it is described as a book about alchemy, it is in its essence really not. It’s interesting to suggest that ages ago, some form of medicine and understanding of genetics and medical science was on par with or even surpassing what we have now, but for some reason got erased from history. Is it so crazy to see this as a possibility though? We have proof that ancient societies might have had an understanding about certain things that baffle us today. I couldn’t help to think about all these things while reading The Apothecary’s Curse.
Why did the last part of the book disappoint then in my opinion? It’s difficult to put words to feelings sometimes. I think it was mainly because of the romantic part in the present time. I had some trouble getting in to their sudden attraction, even though a possible explanation was given for this. I’m not the kind of person to like insta-love, even though it has definitely been very popular in YA the last few years. When the words “love” and “darling” were then thrown around, my brain just went ‘nope’. You’ve known each other for what, a week? Less than that? I seem to stumble over romantic aspects of the books I read often. Am I not a romantic person? Don’t I like lovey-dovey tales? Believe me, I do. To use the popular terminology: I ship certain fictional couples so hard I wish they were real. Or I was one of them. Why is it then that most of the time books can’t seem to get it right for me? Is it all going too fast in standalone books? Too sappy? Too unrealistic? I hope to find out some day.
Don’t be fooled though, I very much enjoyed the book overall. It was interesting, thought-provoking and well written. I’m looking forward to reading more of Barbara Barnett’s work.
thesffreader's review against another edition
3.0
Review originally published on The Curious SFF Reader
I first heard about this book months ago and I was immediatly intrigued, I am not usually a fan of fantasy stories set during the Victorian era because they tend to be very steampunk heavy and I don’t particularly enjoy this genre , however The Apothecary is different, it still manages to incorporate cool elements of magic without falling in the steampunk category.
The Apothecary’s Curse follows two main characters: Gaelan Erceldoune a mysterious apothecary working in London and his friend Dr. Simon Bell. The novel opens up when Bell runs to see his friend late in the night: he’s desesparate to find a cure for his wife Sophie who is suffering from terminal cancer and has hew hours to live. After some convincing, Erceldoune agrees to concoct a potion to save her thanks to a very old family artefact: a book supposedly written by faes of the Tuatha Dé Danann. However, the mixture is not enough to save Sophie and she dies in the arms of Bell who, in desesparation decides to drink the remaining drops of the substance to die with her. To his dismay, not only his tentative fails but he also only manages to make him immortal exactly like Erceldoune who drank an elexir from the book centuries ago to cure himself from the plague.
However, soon after, Erceldoune is accused of murder, and because of that: his house and shop are burnt and the manuscript is nowhere to be found. There begins an epic quest to find the manuscript and cure the two men of immortality.
The structure of the book is very interesting; it takes place in two very different periods: early Victorian London and modern day Chicago The chapters switch between those two timelines: I really liked this aspect of the narration because I found that it made the book way more dynamic that it would have been told in a linear format. I did have a slight preference for the Victorian chapters because they felt richer but I still enjoyed the other ones.
The Apothecary is a debut-novel and it feels like one, it’s a very enjoyable fast-paced read but I did find that it suffered a bit from a lack of characterization, Bell and Erceldoune weren’t one dimentional per say but for immortal beings, I would have liked to see more of what they managed to learn and experience during their life. Also, I thought that the language was a bit too flowery for my liking during the Victorian chapters even though I understand that Barnett tried to make it as close to the actual Victorian way of speaking as possible.
Overall, I really enjoyed this book, it took me a while to get through (about two weeks) but that wasn’t the problem of the book since I was (and still am) in a reading slump. The fact that I actually managed to finish it is a pretty good sign.
I will definitely give her other works a try in the future because I’m sure they will improve and I’m always on the hunt for quick and fun adventures !
Recommended.
I received a copy of this book through Netgalley. My thanks to the SFWA and Pyr. All opinions are my own.
I first heard about this book months ago and I was immediatly intrigued, I am not usually a fan of fantasy stories set during the Victorian era because they tend to be very steampunk heavy and I don’t particularly enjoy this genre , however The Apothecary is different, it still manages to incorporate cool elements of magic without falling in the steampunk category.
The Apothecary’s Curse follows two main characters: Gaelan Erceldoune a mysterious apothecary working in London and his friend Dr. Simon Bell. The novel opens up when Bell runs to see his friend late in the night: he’s desesparate to find a cure for his wife Sophie who is suffering from terminal cancer and has hew hours to live. After some convincing, Erceldoune agrees to concoct a potion to save her thanks to a very old family artefact: a book supposedly written by faes of the Tuatha Dé Danann. However, the mixture is not enough to save Sophie and she dies in the arms of Bell who, in desesparation decides to drink the remaining drops of the substance to die with her. To his dismay, not only his tentative fails but he also only manages to make him immortal exactly like Erceldoune who drank an elexir from the book centuries ago to cure himself from the plague.
However, soon after, Erceldoune is accused of murder, and because of that: his house and shop are burnt and the manuscript is nowhere to be found. There begins an epic quest to find the manuscript and cure the two men of immortality.
The structure of the book is very interesting; it takes place in two very different periods: early Victorian London and modern day Chicago The chapters switch between those two timelines: I really liked this aspect of the narration because I found that it made the book way more dynamic that it would have been told in a linear format. I did have a slight preference for the Victorian chapters because they felt richer but I still enjoyed the other ones.
The Apothecary is a debut-novel and it feels like one, it’s a very enjoyable fast-paced read but I did find that it suffered a bit from a lack of characterization, Bell and Erceldoune weren’t one dimentional per say but for immortal beings, I would have liked to see more of what they managed to learn and experience during their life. Also, I thought that the language was a bit too flowery for my liking during the Victorian chapters even though I understand that Barnett tried to make it as close to the actual Victorian way of speaking as possible.
Overall, I really enjoyed this book, it took me a while to get through (about two weeks) but that wasn’t the problem of the book since I was (and still am) in a reading slump. The fact that I actually managed to finish it is a pretty good sign.
I will definitely give her other works a try in the future because I’m sure they will improve and I’m always on the hunt for quick and fun adventures !
Recommended.
I received a copy of this book through Netgalley. My thanks to the SFWA and Pyr. All opinions are my own.
shoshanaf's review
3.0
This is a great book for fans of Sherlock Holmes that enjoy a little paranormal in their stories.