Source: Vine
Philadelphia. The
late 1870s. A city of cobblestone sidewalks and horse-drawn carriages. Home to
the famous anatomist and surgeon Dr. Spencer Black. The son of a
“resurrectionist” (aka grave robber), Dr. Black studied at Philadelphia’s
esteemed Academy of Medicine, where he develops an unconventional hypothesis:
What if the world’s most celebrated mythological beasts—mermaids, minotaurs,
and satyrs— were in fact the evolutionary ancestors of humankind?
The
Resurrectionist offers two extraordinary books in one. The first is a
fictional biography of Dr. Spencer Black, from his humble beginnings to the
mysterious disappearance at the end of his life. The second book is Black’s
magnum opus: The Codex Extinct Animalia, a Gray’s Anatomy for mythological
beasts—dragons, centaurs, Pegasus, Cerberus—all rendered in meticulously detailed
black-and-white anatomical illustrations. You need only look at these images to
realize they are the work of a madman. The Resurrectionist tells his
story.
Had the book only contained
the intriguing, very detailed anatomical sketches of mythical creatures with human
characteristics (or vice versa), The Resurrectionist still would have been a curious
but fascinating tome. Hudspeth's imaginative rendering of fantasy in a pseudo-medical
setting is ingenious. But the sketches are preceded by a biography of the enigmatic
Dr. Spencer Black, which provides a very sinister dimension, one that is only fully
realized once the reader arrives at the last set of sketches.
There's a quietness
to the narrative style which makes the strange events of his life all the more startling,
beginning with a childhood spent robbing graves of their corpses to provide anatomy
specimens for his father, a medical doctor. From there, Dr. Black's life seems to
settle into normality, only to veer into the macabre, and then the horrific.
Warning: bad things
happen to animals.
With the exception
of one very graphic scene, however, Hudspeth mostly clouds Dr. Black in suggestive
mystery. Is he mad? Is he a genius? A charlatan? What happened to his wife? What
happened to him? The biographical section ends with all of these murky questions
swirling around. But with the illustrations of these strange human/mythical hybrids,
some of them are answered. I turned the last page, thinking, "Oh!"
Fantastic review! I am definitely intrigued.... I love mythical creatures, so this should be fun. Is Hudspeth also the illustrator?
ReplyDeleteYes, he is also the illustrator. Such a disturbing but riveting book. Thank you!
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