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A review by jotterthoughts
Fleshmarket by Nicola Morgan
3.0
I live in Edinburgh. I found this book in an Edinburgh charity shop (RIP Age Scotland I miss you). Does this book deserve to be in a charity shop is the big question?
Probably not to be honest. It's decent. It's not bad at all.
However, it wasn't as good as it could have been if you ask me. If you asked me what happened about ten minutes after I put it down, all I could really do would be to shrug "eh..." There's moments of quality worldbuilding and admittedly, I enjoyed the historic atmosphere. (Even if I questioned some of the distances between the Royal Mile and Duddingston -- spoiler alert, you wouldn't catch me pushing a bread cart up that route.)
The characters were sort of more wishy washy to me. Kind of archetypey...not exactly embraced and developed. Snippets of relationships were really nice but, never really came to satisfying conclusions.
As for plot there seemed to be some kind of build up to a climax that never really hit. There just seemed to be a whole lot of denouement and very little solid action. There's a lot of ideas crammed into this plot and the story barely takes the time to really commit to any of them. Some of these ideas are really interesting but they don't get the time they need. To an extent, I wonder if someone who has no knowledge of Edinburgh and its history would pick up this book and fully appreciate it. It's kind of an identity crisis of a book -- the title and inclusion of Burke and Hare suggests a horror thriller with a historical spin, but this book veered towards almost a .... Medical crime drama.
Was it bad though? Not really. I don't hate that I have it. I might read it again. It's kind of self indulgent to read when you do know the history. Nicola Morgan writes solidly and it is enjoyable. It just feels like it's lacking oomph.
Probably not to be honest. It's decent. It's not bad at all.
However, it wasn't as good as it could have been if you ask me. If you asked me what happened about ten minutes after I put it down, all I could really do would be to shrug "eh..." There's moments of quality worldbuilding and admittedly, I enjoyed the historic atmosphere. (Even if I questioned some of the distances between the Royal Mile and Duddingston -- spoiler alert, you wouldn't catch me pushing a bread cart up that route.)
The characters were sort of more wishy washy to me. Kind of archetypey...not exactly embraced and developed. Snippets of relationships were really nice but, never really came to satisfying conclusions.
As for plot there seemed to be some kind of build up to a climax that never really hit. There just seemed to be a whole lot of denouement and very little solid action. There's a lot of ideas crammed into this plot and the story barely takes the time to really commit to any of them. Some of these ideas are really interesting but they don't get the time they need. To an extent, I wonder if someone who has no knowledge of Edinburgh and its history would pick up this book and fully appreciate it. It's kind of an identity crisis of a book -- the title and inclusion of Burke and Hare suggests a horror thriller with a historical spin, but this book veered towards almost a .... Medical crime drama.
Was it bad though? Not really. I don't hate that I have it. I might read it again. It's kind of self indulgent to read when you do know the history. Nicola Morgan writes solidly and it is enjoyable. It just feels like it's lacking oomph.