Suspense

Another amazing story with Hester, William, Scuff, Sir Oliver and other supporting characters. Hester is filling in for a nurse friend and working the night shift at the Royal Naval Hospital. A young girl asks for help to save her brother who is very sick. Hester helps the young boy by giving him fluids. She later finds out that the doctor, Dr. Magnus Rand and his chemist brother, Hamilton Rand, are taking blood from all three children, (Charlie, Maggie and Mike), who they bought from their parents. The blood is used experimentally to try to save lives through a very new, unauthorized and radical procedure of blood transfusion. When a wealthy man (Bryson Radnor) is brought in by his daughter, Adrienne, Mr. Rand begins treatment. Hester strongly protests using the children’s blood as it is harming them. To silence her protests, Mr. Rand chloroforms her, kidnaps her and the three children and takes them and the patient and his daughter to an old family farm cottage in the country. Hester is forced to treat Radnor and to take care of the children as best she can. She learns if the patient dies, she and the children could be killed also as witnesses. There is an armed gardner on patrol. When Hester disappears, Monk, Scuff and later sergeant Hooper search for her and eventually find and rescue Hester and the children. With help from Squeaky and Worm.

Meanwhile, Monk is dealing with smugglers and an old nemesis that he cannot totally remember. In an attempt to catch the smugglers, Monk and his men fight a terrible battle in which Sergeant Orme is injured and loses so much blood that he dies. Monk and all the River Police are devasted.

Mr. Rand and Adrienne Radnor are charged with kidnapping Hester and the three children. The case is rejected by the judge when Bryson Radnor bursts in the courtroom to show his miraculous recovery. Later, when Adrienne is found dead, the only suspect seems to be Mr. Rand even though Hester doesn’t think he did it. She believes it is the arrogant, selfish Mr. Radnor that killed his own daughter instead of repaying her kindness in caring for him. He’s a very bad man and in the end, karma catches up with him.

Oliver assists attorney Juster at both trials.


The idea of how blood transfusions were developed was interesting and the idea that blood types were not known about then so it was a guessing game as to when a transfusion would work. ( )

Hester Monk is again nursing, filling in for an ailing friend. She is stopped one evening in the corridor by a child pleading for help for her dying brother . . . only there aren’t supposed to be any children in this hospital. She discovers the boy and another sibling, very ill indeed. Before long, she and the children are taken, kidnapped, to a secluded location, where experiments are being conducted by a genius chemist and his doctor brother who are seeking a cure for the “white-blood disease.” They believe the cure lies in blood transfusions, if they can get the right donors, willing or not. Hester gets snared unwillingly in their scheme, and she fears for her life as well as for the lives of the children when they are no longer needed. Monk is also anxious for his wife’s return. It’s a complex and somewhat convoluted tale, told in typical Anne Perry style. The villains are quite despicable, but perhaps some excuse could be made for their motive of saving lives, even if that means losing some in the process. There are long stretches of “thinking conversations” where the characters are reasoning things out, but that is how this author writes. The book may have only gotten three stars from me most of the way through, but the ending raised it to four stars. ( )

In the 21st book of the William Monk series, most of the action centers around Hester. She had gone back to nursing at a hospital as a favor to a friend when she finds a secret ward with three children in beds. They are there as part of an experiment run by Hamilton Rand, a brilliant chemist who is trying to find a cure for the 'white blood disease,' a form of leukemia in today's terms. When Hester and the children disappear, it is up to Monk and his team to find them before it's too late.
Ms. Perry never disappoints. While the mysteries are always good, I find the thing that sets her books apart is how she integrates social issues we still have today into her books. In this case, Hester is torn: she's been kidnapped, and she and the children may not make it out alive, yet Rand's experiment has the potential to save many lives. As a nurse, she understands how successful blood transfusions could be a medical miracle for many people. The discussion of this ethical conundrum is interesting, and Ms. Perry doesn't offer a solution but leaves it to the reader to ponder.
Another great book in a great series. ( )

This could have been a really good book!! The premise was amazing. The invention of blood transfusions without the knowledge of blood type must have been harrowing to endure as a doctor or nurse. To not know why the blood from this person worked...

Unfortunately, I have to agree with other reviewers who mentioned this book being "phoned in". So many errors. ( )