The Marriage Of Souls Book

Dr. Silas Grange, the junior of Lymington's two physicians has fallen prey to a mysterious illness connected, in some manner, with the sudden departure from the Hampshire town of the independent and philanthropic Mrs Quill. It's 1798--and Grange is an atheist, a democrat, prone to austerity (his housekeeper, Mrs Thompson is disgusted by his refusal to eat anything richer than fish broth) and the proponent of the new medical methods being taught in the Scottish universities. He is also deeply concerned about the working conditions in the salt furnaces that form the bulk of local industry. His senior colleague, Dr Hargood, favours extensive blood-letting, extensive feasting, high laissez-faire Toryism and the keeping of mistresses.This is a deeply unusual and self-conscious rites-of-passage novel in which the main protagonist doesn't make a personal appearance until the last few of the 480-plus pages: "Hargood had said of Mrs Quill's absence, "It is like a novel, sir, which should leave some presence with you, some aftertaste, which shall remain widowed away in the soul." "It's no accident that the story's set when it is, just after the French Revolution and just prior to the turning of the century--on the cusp of major social, political and economic changes. The Marriage of Souls gets off to a slow start, but amply rewards the persistent reader with its measured considerations of the complex relations between men of opposing temperaments and belief systems, between men and women, between capitalism and philanthropy, between love and independence. --Lisa GeeRead More