Jonathan Goodman (ed) - Medical Murders - BCA - 1992
(Book originally published by Piatkus the previous year)
Contributors ; Jonathan Goodman, Edward H Smith, Harold Eaton, Joan Lock, Rev Evelyn Burnaby and 8 others
This was a book I found on a charity stall at my local supermarket. Having proffered what I hope was a suitable donation I trotted happily home, ready to immerse myself in the world of murderous medics, dangerous doctors and poisonous practitioners.
The book was enjoyable, but a bit patchy. Most of the pieces were originally published in other true crime collections, a couple seem to have been written specifically for inclusion in this volume and two were originally newspaper articles.
Some contributors have done their homework - Albert Borowitz has clearly made a particular study of the murder of Dr George Parkman at Harvard Medical College in Boston (1849) - but while I may be treating them unfairly, others may not have drawn on such a wide range of sources.
All are readable and informative, however, though I did feel that Richard Whittington-Egan in his piece on the crimes of Arthur Warren Waite rather overdid the humour and at times his comments were ill-judged.
Overall, I am happy to have read this book, and I would be tempted to seek out other works by some of the contributors, but I would be not be in a hurry to try any of Jonathan Goodmans` other crime collections - unless another unexpected bargain comes my way, of course.
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