Friday, July 26, 2013

Friday Memes: The Resurrectionist by Matthew Guinn

Happy Friday everybody!
Book Beginnings on Friday is now hosted by Rose City Reader. The Friday 56 is hosted at Freda's Voice. Check out the links above for the rules and for the posts of the participants each week. Don’t dig for your favorite book, the coolest, the most intellectual. Use the CLOSEST.

This week I am spotlighting a book a friend chose for me at ALA. The Resurrectionist by Matthew Guinn is a Southern Gothic mystery and thriller. Here is the description of this July 8 release:
A young doctor wrestles with the legacy of a slave “resurrectionist” owned by his South Carolina medical school.

"Dog days and the fresh bodies are arriving once again." So begins the fall term at South Carolina Medical College, where Dr. Jacob Thacker is on probation for Xanax abuse. His interim career—working public relations for the dean—takes an unnerving detour into the past when the bones of African American slaves, over a century old, are unearthed on campus. Out of the college’s dark past, these bones threaten to rise and condemn the present.

In the middle of the nineteenth century, Dr. Frederick Augustus Johnston, one of the school’s founders, had purchased a slave for his unusual knife skills. This slave, Nemo ("no man") would become an unacknowledged member of the surgical faculty by day—and by night, a "resurrectionist," responsible for procuring bodies for medical study. An unforgettable character, by turns apparently insouciant, tormented, and brilliant, and seen by some as almost supernatural, Nemo will seize his self-respect in ways no reader can anticipate.

With exceptional storytelling pacing and skill, Matthew Guinn weaves together past and present to relate a Southern Gothic tale of shocking crimes and exquisite revenge, a riveting and satisfying moral parable of the South.
Beginning:
Dog days and the fresh bodies are arriving once again. Always, Jacob feels the old stir of anticipation when the baked stillness of August us broken by their return to campus, these young people crackling with energy in the last sullen days of summer.
Friday 56:
"It is. We named our man Henry. Not very imaginative, I know. I used to have dreams of old naked Henry climbing off the table and chasing me with a scalpel." 

8 comments:

  1. A horror story, for sure! Hope you are enjoying it.

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  2. Interesting start to this novel! I remember stumbling across it on GoodReads, was rather curious about it...Thanks for sharing this title, happy reading :)

    My Friday Book Memes

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  3. Hi Kathy,

    This is a definite for my reading list. I have something similar already in my review pile, so that's at least two fantastic books to look forward to.

    The synopsis alone swung it for me, however your opening lines and page 56 illustrations, really clinched it!

    Thanks so much for featuring this book and have a great weekend.

    Yvonne

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  4. I've seen this one around and it looks really good!

    Thanks for participating in Books Beginnings on Fridays!

    Rose City Reader

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  5. That is an excellent beginning...love the "word pictures." And the story sounds like one I'd enjoy.

    Here's MY FRIDAY MEMES POST

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  6. Interesting beginning. Thanks for visiting.

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  7. A very atmospheric opening! Thanks for visiting my blog too Kathy. The quote at the top of your blog makes me smile every time I visit! :)

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