Beloved Poison

'Vivid, pungent and perilous' CHRIS BROOKMYRE'Evocative...brilliant plotting' REBECCA GRIFFITHSA dark and richly atmospheric thriller, perfect for fans of Laura Purcell's The Silent Companions, Sarah Perry's Melmoth and Elly Griffiths' The Stranger Diaries. London, 1846. Ramshackle and crumbling, St Saviour's Infirmary awaits demolition. Within its stinking wards and cramped corridors the doctors bicker and fight. Ambition, jealousy and hatred seethe beneath the veneer of professional courtesy. Always an outsider, and with a secret of her own to hide, apothecary Jem Flockhart observes everything, but says nothing. And then six tiny coffins are uncovered, inside each a handful of dried flowers and a bundle of mouldering rags. When Jem comes across these strange relics hidden inside the infirmary's old chapel, her quest to understand their meaning prises open a long-forgotten past - with fatal consequences . . . Praise for E.S. Thomson:'It's rare that a book is Gothic enough for me, but Beloved Poison is killing it. The blood, the bones...' LAURA PURCELL'Complex, harrowing and highly enjoyable' DAILY EXPRESS'Marvellous, vivid . . . breathtakingly dark' JANET ELLIS'Jem Flockhart books are the best I've read in years' KIRSTY LOGAN'A marvel . . . thoroughly engrossing' MARY PAULSON ELLIS