**"A compelling historical novel steeped in mystery with strong elements of a medical thriller."--READERS' FAVORITE Book Reviews, 5-stars"An interesting plot and insight into the practice of medicine in the early twentieth century . . . It kept me reading and did not disappoint."--HISTORICAL NOVEL SOCIETY Book ReviewsFinalist, 2018 Eric Hoffer Book Award, 2017 AZ Literary Awards, and a Medallion Honoree of the Book Readers Appreciation Group**In the spring of 1907, Abigail Platford finds herself unexpectedly adrift in New York City. Penniless and full of self-doubt, she has abandoned her dream of someday attending medical school and becoming a doctor like her late father. Instead, she takes a minor position in the office of Dr. Franklin Rome, hoping at least to maintain contact with the world of medicine that fascinates her. She soon learns that the handsome and sophisticated Dr. Rome is one of a rare new breed of so-called *beauty doctors* who chisel noses, pin back ears, trim eyelids and inject wrinkles with paraffin. At first skeptical, she begins to open her mind, and then her heart, to Dr. Rome. But his proposed business partnership to build an Institute of Transformative Surgery with an eccentric inventor and collector of *human oddities* raises troubling questions. Soon Abigail is ensnared in a web of treachery that challenges her most cherished beliefs about a doctor’s sacred duty and threatens to destroy all she loves. A suspenseful work of historical fiction grounded in the social and moral issues of the Edwardian era in America.words : 105998