The Minutes of the Lazarus Club
Tony Pollard
The Minutes of the Lazarus Club
London, 1857 - the Lazarus Club. Some of the finest, most-unconventional minds in Victorian Britain - including Charles Darwin, Charles Babbage and Isambard Kingdom Brunel - are members of this illustrious brotherhood. Their meetings take place behind closed doors, their discussions are revolutionary and their conclusions sometimes forbidden...Knowing nothing of this secret society, Dr George Phillips, a young and ambitious surgeon, is intrigued to encounter Brunel over a well-used cadaver in the gory pit of his dissection theatre. It soon becomes apparent that the great engineer has mysterious plans for the good doctor. And so Phillips becomes embroiled in the enigmatic machinations of the Lazarus Club, unaware that in the midst of their unorthodox club, a black conspiracy lurks. Not only is his own life in jeopardy, but as the first mutilated body is washed up on the banks of the Thames so the very foundations of Victorian society are set to be rocked to their core...
2.9 out of 5 based on 4 reviews
|
Omniscore:
|
| Classification |
Fiction |
| Genre |
Historical Fiction |
| Format |
Hardback |
| Pages |
448 |
| RRP |
£12.99 |
| Date of Publication |
August 2008 |
| ISBN |
978-0718154035 |
| Publisher |
Michael Joseph |
| |
London, 1857 - the Lazarus Club. Some of the finest, most-unconventional minds in Victorian Britain - including Charles Darwin, Charles Babbage and Isambard Kingdom Brunel - are members of this illustrious brotherhood. Their meetings take place behind closed doors, their discussions are revolutionary and their conclusions sometimes forbidden...Knowing nothing of this secret society, Dr George Phillips, a young and ambitious surgeon, is intrigued to encounter Brunel over a well-used cadaver in the gory pit of his dissection theatre. It soon becomes apparent that the great engineer has mysterious plans for the good doctor. And so Phillips becomes embroiled in the enigmatic machinations of the Lazarus Club, unaware that in the midst of their unorthodox club, a black conspiracy lurks. Not only is his own life in jeopardy, but as the first mutilated body is washed up on the banks of the Thames so the very foundations of Victorian society are set to be rocked to their core...
Reviews
The Scotsman
Allan Massie
“Murder, skullduggery and other dark doings abound. Novels of this type require gusto if they are to succeed, and there is certainly no lack of gusto here. The villains are suitably villainous, ingenious and ruthless, the virtuous suitably brave, the narrator suitably dogged and agreeably often in danger... In short, this novel is a fine example of what Maurice Bowra called "the Higher Bogus". It's full of intellectual quirks, lively speculation, and agreeable invention. I scarcely believed a word of it, but found it highly enjoyable.”
15/08/2008
Read Full Review
The Daily Telegraph
Toby Clements
“...this one takes time to emerge but it is worth sticking with because although it is over-researched - almost a paean to our industrial past - it is a ripper... This welter of scientific heritage almost sinks the plot - bodies in the Thames, all missing their hearts - but it roars to life in the second half, as Philips confronts a man who keeps his mother in a vat of preserving fluid, sinister arms dealers and some highly ingenious metalwork.”
24/08/2008
Read Full Review
The Independent
Roz Kaveney
“Pollard is often exciting in his desperate chases around wharves, warehouses and cemeteries, and occasionally touching in his hero's failure to understand the limited usefulness of his ideas. Where the book fails is that Pollard finds himself caught in almost every standard plot going... That some of these turn out to be colossal red herrings is laughable rather than clever... At its best, it does what all genre novels should: entertain us by gaming with our expectations of what sort of book this is.”
07/08/2008
Read Full Review
The Guardian
Matthew Lewin
“This is a gaslight thriller, set in the 1850s, with a cast to die for - Brunel, Darwin, Faraday, Babbage and Bazalgette are all brought together by the author, a noted battlefield and forensic archaeologist who has clearly done a great deal of research... It should have been an exciting romp, but it is a miasma of ponderous writing - and the plot becomes more and more preposterous with every over-written page.”
23/08/2008
Read Full Review