Fever Season (Benjamin January, Book 2) [Mass Market Paperback]

Barbara Hambly (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 4, 1999

Benjamin January made his debut in bestselling author Barbara Hambly's A Free Man of Color, a haunting mélange of history and mystery. Now he returns in another novel of greed, madness, and murder amid the dark shadows and dazzling society of old New Orleans, named a Notable Book of the Year by the New York Times.

The summer of 1833 has been one of brazen heat and brutal pestilence, as the city is stalked by Bronze John—the popular name for the deadly yellow fever epidemic that tests the healing skills of doctor and voodoo alike. Even as Benjamin January tends the dying at Charity Hospital during the steaming nights, he continues his work as a music teacher during the day.

When he is asked to pass a message from a runaway slave to the servant of one of his students, January finds himself swept into a tempest of lies, greed, and murder that rivals the storms battering New Orleans. And to find the truth he must risk his freedom...and his very life.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

In New Orleans in 1833, appearance is everything for people of color. "His own coat and waistcoat ... were one badge of his freedom," Barbara Hambly writes about Ben January, a surgeon and teacher of music. "Even more than the papers the law demanded he carry--and as much as the well-bred French his tutors and his mother had hammered into him as a child--they said, This is a free man of color, not somebody's property to be bought and sold." When the veteran science fiction writer Hambly first introduced January, in the stunning and heartbreaking A Free Man of Color, the only problem seemed to be that the book told us so much about a vanished world that it couldn't possibly support a sequel. Fortunately, Hambly has found a way to make it work by putting January into a real crime, the case of a woman named Delphine Lalaurie whose savagery toward her slaves managed to shock even her contemporaries. "She was a tall woman, imperially straight; and though nearly every Creole woman of her age had surrendered to rich food and embonpoint, she retained the slim figure of a girl," Hambly writes of the majestic Delphine on her first meeting with January. She has come to the reeking, corpse-clogged hospital where January is working during a cholera epidemic to warn him about helping a runaway slave girl accused of murder. Ignoring that warning puts January into a situation so full of danger to himself and others that in lesser hands it could easily have become overwrought. Hambly, however, knows better than anyone that readers connect to characters rooted in honesty, regardless of how alien their environment may seem to us. --Dick Adler --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

Learned black surgeon Benjamin January returns from his debut as protagonist in A Free Man of Color (1997) to utilize his considerable skills in a graphic and compelling story based on events that transpired in 1834. The Paris-trained physician, still grieving for his recently deceased wife, is back in New Orleans after a 16-year absence and his now treating the victims of a raging cholera epidemic. But his position at Charity Hospital is precariousAaccepted in his own mixed-race society, he is scorned by most whites. Now, even in the chaotic mayhem of an epidemic, January becomes aware of a disturbing fact: free people of color are disappearing. Are they dying? Are they being abducted to be resold as slaves? Although chronically fatigued from his multiple occupations (he gives piano lessons to eke out his income) and the demands of his eccentric family, he nonetheless manages to begin a discreet investigation that will involve some unique and idiosyncratic individuals including street people, con men and aristocrats. He even forms an unlikely alliance with a coarse, yet astute, white police lieutenant. January's queries are further complicated by the disappearance of his friend Cora, who may be implicated in theft and murder. Complex in plotting, rich in atmosphere and written in powerful, lucid prose, this compelling mystery holds its secrets until a horrifying, compelling finale.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 416 pages
• Publisher: Bantam; Reprint edition (May 4, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0553575279
• ISBN-13: 978-0553575279
• Product Dimensions: 4.2 x 0.8 x 7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (23 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #628,416 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Many shades of gray in old New Orleans, April 4, 2002

By 

Jack Fitzgerald "JFD" (Seattle, WA United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Fever Season (Benjamin January, Book 2) (Mass Market Paperback)

Benjamin January (Janvier)- free man of color, educated, speaks several languages, classically trained pianist (and guitarist)as well as Paris-educated surgeon and now amateur sleuth. An interesting character to what could build into a great series.

The plot at first seems simple, January must discover the true killer of Otis Redfern, but along the way he gets involved with slave kidnapping, slanderous accusations among so-called "medical professionals" and must carefully maneuver the caste hierarchy that existed in 1830's New Orleans.

Here are things I liked about the book:
The level of detail presented was excellent, from the character's skin tone, dress and physicality to the way they spoke. The buildings and period description immerse the reader into that time. The atmosphere of hot summer, fever and cholera is as much a character as the people. In fact, once the summer was over and the plot remained unresolved I thought it took a little of the edge off the story.

I like that the characters, both black and white and in between, are depicted in shades of gray and shadows. Not every white person is shown as a cruel slave owner or crude illiterate and not every person of color or black is shown as a noble victim of the oppressed.

These are complex characters with the illusion of reality. January's best friend, Hannibal, is an Irish violin virtuoso who reads several languages and reels off quotes but is also a drunk, an opium addict infected with consumption and regular customer with prostitutes.

Abishag Shaw, January's associate with the law, is an unwashed, tobacco-spitting Kaintuck but who knows enough French to pronouce the names correctly and has a strong but unspoken moral and ethical code.

The story also introduces Rose Vitrac, an educated woman of color who runs a school for girls that want something more than to be a placee for a white man. Rose is also a complex character, emotionally scarred, but provides a good ally for January.

There are many other interesting characters and again I enjoyed the way January moves through the various levels of this society. The medical practice was truly horrifying.

My main critique is that January is always thinking about the caste system that exists there. Always. It sometimes detracted from the plot. I also wanted to get deeper into his relationship with his mother. Livia Levesque was one not given much dimension.
I also was a little disappointed with the historical epilogue and felt it was not needed.

My questions: What happens next? Will January and Rose develop a relationship? Where does his career go from here?

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I love Ben Janvier!, July 6, 1998

By 

[e-mail] (Houston, Texas) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Fever Season (Benjamin January, Book 2) (Hardcover)

When I saw the book on the new fiction shelf I gasped for joy! I could hardly wait to get home, tell my family I was unavailable for the weekend, and curl up for a good read. Ben Janvier and New Orleans of 1833 were back! And I was not disappointed. These characters are so well limned that they seem real. The caste system in New Orleans is terrible, but more terrible still is the assumption by the newly arrived "Americans" that all people of dark skin (or light skin, yet of African heritage) are to be seen only in terms of potential dollar value. One appreciates the only good "Kaintuck," Shaw, although I got a little squimish with all of his tobacco spitting. Still, this book is highly recommended reading for lovers of a good mystery! By the way, after my review of the previous Janvier novel, I got TONS of e-mail telling me that this novel was BEFORE the civil war, not ANTE bellum. Folks -- ante bellum means before the civil war. Anyway, read and enjoy!

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating! ! !, May 27, 1999

By 

L. Thiele (Gonzales, Texas) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Fever Season (Benjamin January, Book 2) (Mass Market Paperback)

When I first saw that Barbara Hambly was moving away from fantasy, I was disappointed. She is one of my favorites. But then I read "A Free Man of Color" and "Fever Season" and was blown away. The characters are rich and the amount of research and work that went into the story must have been massive. She picks you up and puts you right down in 1833 New Orleans.

One thing for sure, you don't go to New Orleans without wondering where it all happened.

Thank you for a wonderful book.