DNF: A Lady in the Smoke

A Lady in the Smoke (2016) Karen Odden

Set in England in 1874.

I actually got 80% through this book, but I was tired and wanted to go to sleep, so I skipped to the end, and then had no desire to go back and discover the details of what actually happened. Which was kinda silly, because I knew the doctor was going to get off, and I still don’t know why, but I realized I didn’t care enough to go back and find out.

Lady Elizabeth Fraseris returning home after her fourth season and an embarrassing incident when the train she and her mother are on wrecks, and although she pulls her mother from the wreckage, a dependence upon laudanum caused a dangerous unconsciousness that forced Lady Elizabeth to remain at the hotel.

To compound her problems, she assists the surgeon in treating the accident victims at her hotel–an action that could be seen as further ruining her for marriage.

“This is the first pleasant hour I’ve had in days.”

The fire cracked and popped in the silence between us. I didn’t dare take the compliment seriously, so instead I adopted his light tone: “That’s not much of a standard, Mr. Wilcox.”

“No?”

“You’ve spent the last twenty-four hours doing nothing but working and going without sleep and food.”

The problem I think is that things kept happening: the train accident, her mother’s laudanum addiction, her assisting the doctor, her being drawn into the reasons for the train crash, her discover that her dowry may depend upon the railway, her mother’s breakdown after her father and brother’s deaths, her mother’s secret love affair, a friend in disgrace, a hated rival of her family pretending to act in her best interest… I think there were more, but I lost track.

And I think I just clarified what I found wrong with the story.

Publisher: Alibi

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