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THE PHYSICIAN'S TALE
by Ann Benson
Delacorte Press, November 2006
528 pages
$24.00
ISBN: 0385335059


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

The near future: Tom and Janie Crow take a perilous journey from their small settlement somewhere in central Massachusetts to the Hebrew Book Depository to get the copy of the personal journal (that is housed in a safe) of Dr Alejandro Canchas, a physician who lived in the time of the bubonic plague.

Myra, the caretaker, has the DR SAM (Drug Resistant Staphylococcus aureus and so on) plague and is dying. Janie, a doctor, and her husband Tom, get the journal and return safely to their compound. This is the second coming of the DR SAM plague. The first go-round killed so many people that civilization disintegrated.

Back in the 14th century, Dr Alejandro Canches is treating a Christian English couple who have settled among the Jews of Avignon. The wife turns on Canches for enough money to be able to return to England. De Chauliac, a friend to Canches, gets Alejandro to the Papal palace so he can get out of France.

Kate, the illegitimate daughter of Edward III, had been brought up by Canches, but she is now back in the English court, a pawn to the political ambitions of the king. Canches is bringing up a young boy, who is really Kate's son.

The characters of the 14th century are more alive than those of the 21st century in this final episode in Benson's trilogy, which started in 1997 with THE PLAGUE TALES. Instead of using parallel narratives, I think the story would have had more immediacy if Benson has written the story chronologically. I finished this one and knew everything that had gone before.

I feel no need to return to read the two earlier books in the series, especially since the first came out nine years ago. Not many writers can sustain interest in a series when the books come out three years apart.

Reviewed by Barbara Franchi, November 2006

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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