Customer Reviews

A Plague on Both Your Houses

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I had a bit of trouble caring about the supposed motive behind the murders and found it overly complicated. But I did care about the character of Matthew. He is well drawn, interesting and a character I would follow through a series. For me, though, the most interesting aspect was Matt's trying to deal with the plague and its impact, which was beyond imagination. It was a good first book; enough so that I shall read more of the series.

PLAGUE ON BOTH YOUR HOUSES introduces us to Matthew Bartholomew, a 14th Century physician working at the University of Cambridge. Bartholomew, whose medical views are ridiculed by other less progressive doctors, investigates the suspicious death of a high college official, the first in a series of deaths that he soon realizes is connected with a shadowy power struggle between the Oxford and Cambridge colleges. As the body count rises, these deaths become overshadowed by the onslaught of the Black Death, which has been sweeping through Europe and now England.

On the book's plus side, Gregory certainly has an eye for detail; her depictions of Cambridge circa-1348 transport you back to that time. Likewise the characters were fairly well-rounded and I enjoyed Bartholomew.

The book, however, is a long stretch of road, being 402 pages long. I felt some of Bartholomew's endless speculations after each new murder were repetitious. How many times can you read "Could so-and-so be...?" "But then how did...?" "And what is so-and-so's role in this?" before enough is enough.

Frankly I thought the Black Death was a much more interesting subject than the intercollegiate rivalry plot element. Gregory's descriptions of the disease's utter devastation made for gripping reading. I would have much preferred she dumped the Oxford-Cambridge intrigue and focused the story on the incredible impact the Black Death has on a town like Cambridge and the efforts of a 14th Century physician to save the townspeople.

In short, the book has shortcomings but also enough merit that readers should enjoy the story and look forward to the next installment of Bartholomew's adventures.

The black plague is spreading through England and, in 1348, it reaches the newly formed college of Cambridge, decimating the scholars and masters alike. Physician Matthew Bartholomew, struggles to find both a cause and a cure, with his modern ideas on cleanliness and good sanitation being scorned as nonsense by the other doctors at the University. A rash of unexplained deaths occurs at the same time as the arrival of the plague, which gives the murderers a good chance of passing the deaths off as being plague related. It's an interesting topic with the main characters well defined, but I found it to be an unnecessarily wordy book, with points being repeated over and over. I was considering this series to be a follow up to my beloved Cadfael series but...perhaps one more to make sure!

Susanna Gregory is the pseudonym of a Cambridge academic who was previously a coroner's officer. Her series of mediaeval mysteries have gained a formidable following. This book is the first in the series and introduces the physician Matthew Bartholomew to the reader. There are now a number of books in the series and they are always eagerly awaited by the author's fans.

Besides practising medicine Matthew is also a teacher at a Cambridge University and his sometimes unorthodox treatment of his patients draws accusations of heresy from his more traditional, but less skilled colleagues.

The year is 1348 and the inhabitants of Cambridge live under the shadow of a terrible pestilence that has swept through northern Europe, crossed the channel and moved voraciously through southern England. As if Matthew had not enough to contend with he is distracted by the death of the Master of the university, an inexplicable death and one that the authorities do not seem to want solving.

When three more scholars died in unexplained circumstances Bartholomew decides enough is enough and begins his own enquiry into the death, but his pursuit of the truth leads him into a complex tangle of lies and deceit that causes him to question the innocence or otherwise of close friends and even his family. On top of all this the Black Death has finally arrived in Cambridge . . .

No one can match Ellis Peters. I'm beginning to understand this.
I was given this book as a present. Being a Medievalist, I am always excited to read
anything about the era.
And it probably wasn't a good idea that I had just finished reading "The Rose Rent" by Peters, because I was suddenly faced with a poor comparison.
Firstly, the body count was a bit vicious. Five dead in the first twenty pages, it felt like. But it didn't end there! I was prepared to deal with one murder, maybe two, but having so many die in the course of a novel felt less like a murder mystery and more like a serial killer book.

Secondly, to deal with the body count, you had an umpteenth number of characters I could never keep straight. I should have made a list of who's who at the beginning. The author's habit of switching first and last names also made it confusing. I could only keep the four main female characters straight, although Gregory keeps making sure we know who Rachel is every time she appeared and reminding the reader why she owed so much to Matt. I found this repetition annoying and unnecessary.

Thirdly, Matt is an idiot. I did like him, but, as the story progressed, I found myself losing patience with his constant questioning and doubting of people he had known for years. The long internal monologues were frustrating too.

Fourth, what was going on and why? I still have no idea why all these people were murdered and for what. Even with the lengthy "bad guy explains everything" at the end.

Fifth, I never felt a part of this world. Peters writes in such a way that you can picture the Severn and the orchards. Gregory doesn't even describe the town in much detail. Gregory is an okay writer, but lacks descriptive skills and too often tells the reader instead of showing.

I don't think I'll bother with the rest of the series. I'll just stick with Cadfael.

For me this book fell very firmly in the three star category for several reasons. First, there was so little character development that I never understood completely who they were or how they came to be in the story. They were just that, names of characters. For an author to have many characters in a novel is definitely not a fault. For me to have trouble keeping them separated into individuals throughout the entire novel says to me that there is a problem somewhere. With background information and depth of development I can separate out the people in a novel and often assign specific jogs to my memory to keep them separate. It didn't work for me here. Even the main character was never more than a physician named Matthew Bartholomew.

Secondly, the basic plot was interesting, but it seemed to simply trudge, trudge, trudge along. I understand that the plague is a central "character" in this novel, but, gosh I got tired of reading about every person who got sick. The book I was reading from is an omnibus with the first two stories in the Matthew Bartholomew series. This first book had 406 pages. Seriously, I started counting the pages at around the 200 page mark. And it turns out that there were many examples of repetition of the story which could have very easily been left out.

I want very much to like this series. I enjoy medieval mysteries and Susanna Gregory is a new author for me. There are many stories in the series. I already have the second book in the series, An Unholy Alliance (Matthew Bartholomew Chronicles), so I will read that novel in hopes that most of what I experienced here will have been ironed out by judicious editing techniques learned in the publishing of this novel. I do have to say though, I'm in no rush to begin reading that second book.

Matthew Bartholomew is a physician and instructor at Michaelhouse, one of the Colleges at the young Cambridge University. His views of medicine are rather unorthodox for the 14th century, and he is viewed with suspicion by other doctors. On the eve of the Black Death, in the summer of 1348, the Master of Michaelhouse, Sir John, turns up dead. Everyone assumes it must be suicide, but Bartholomew has his doubts--especially since more bodies turn up. Bartholomew's investigation leads him to something much better--a potential plot by Oxford scholars to undermine the credibility of Cambridge, perhaps?

Bartholomew is one of the more interesting and complicated detectives I've come across in a long while. He's not limited by the medical practices of the period (as we're told early on, his training was unorthodox, too), so he does seem a bit too modern at times (for example, in addition to being a physician, he also practices surgery, which at that time was practiced by barbers). I liked the plot; and as some who studied the 14th century as a student (even wrote a paper on the Black Death), I was interested by Bartholomew's appraisal of the pestilence. He may have been trained by eastern doctors, but Bartholomew is just as in the dark about the bubonic plague as anybody else is in 14th century England. My interest was in the effect the plague had on the medieval mindset, so I was interested to see how people reacted: from self-flagellation, to going stark, staring mad, to throwing caution to the wind and enjoying full-tilt the pleasures of life, it's all seen in this novel. Well done, there.

There are a lot of anachronisms, though: during the riot at the beginning of the book, the townspeople are referred to as "townies: (a mid-19th century invention); the author has her characters refer to themselves as "medieval"; the characters call the Black Death the "Death," when people of the time would have called it pestilence (the term "Black Death" is 19th century in origin). Another character arrives" in the nick of time" to save our hero, hostels are arranged into "cartels," and doctor are referred to repeatedly as "medics." Bartholomew also expresses surprise when a tinker's widow tells him she can't read or write. The author seems a little bit confused by the medieval difference between a surgeon and a physician, and for a doctor, Bartholomew is awfully squeamish about the human body. Also, Bartholomew himself admits that he doesn't know what brought the pestilence in, but he has a strange fascination with the rats scurrying about in the College.... these anachronisms aren't obscure, a simple search in the OED will give you the origins of most of these words. But other than the anachronisms, I really enjoyed the plot of the novel, and look forward to seeing more of Matthew Bartholomew.

Not great. Not the greatest mystery plot. And the characters weren't compelling. The details about the plague were fascinating, and the author effectively portrayed its impact on life. I was a bit disappointed when comparing this first in the series to Candace Robb or of course Ellis Peters. But it was good and I will read the next.