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Stephanie Cowell's The Physician of London, propels the reader into a fictional 17th-century England that is brought beautifully to life. A sequel to Nicholas Cooke, The Physician of London finds a middle-aged Nicholas amidst the degenerating Stuart monarchy and a cast of Elizabethan characters that includes archbishop William Laud, actor friends of Shakespeare, and the physician William Harve... More

Stephanie Cowell's The Physician of London, propels the reader into a fictional 17th-century England that is brought beautifully to life. A sequel to Nicholas Cooke, The Physician of London finds a middle-aged Nicholas amidst the degenerating Stuart monarchy and a cast of Elizabethan characters that includes archbishop William Laud, actor friends of Shakespeare, and the physician William Harvey. Early on in the book the physician and priest befriends a young landowner, Thomas Wentworth, whom he finds in a faint outside his house. As history unfolds, Nicholas and Thomas form a science society, fall in love with the same woman, and eventually diverge into different political camps. Meanwhile, England is divided by the struggle for power between the established monarchy and the increasingly strong landed gentry.

For a historical novel to succeed it has a two-fold task: to live up to the facts of the time period in which it is placed, and to sustain an interesting plot without becoming mired in historical detail. The Physician of London does this with ease, moving back and forth between characters and situations both real and imagined while using a prose style that seems completely believable for the setting. Cowell's love for the time period is obvious, but she never allows the book to be overwhelmed by history. Instead, her novel is firmly grounded in the complex and conflicted character of Nicholas Cooke--proving that while fashions and phrases change, some things about human nature never do.

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