Edinburgh, Scotland, 1828. James Willoughby has abandoned his posh, sheltered life at Oxford to pursue a lifelong dream of studying surgery in Edinburgh. The university offers everything James desires—except the chance to work on a human cadaver. For that, he must join one of the private schools in Surgeon’s Square, at a cost he cannot afford. In desperation, he strikes a deal with Aneurin Nye MacKinnon, a dashing young dissectionist with an artist’s eye for anatomy and a reckless passion for knowledge. But James soon realizes he’s made a devil’s bargain...
Nye is a body snatcher. And James has unwittingly become his accomplice, rapidly descending into the underground ranks of the Resurrectionists—the body snatchers infamous for stealing fresh corpses from churchyards to be used as anatomical specimens. Before long, James is caught up in a life-or-death scheme as rival snatchers compete in a morbid race for power.
James and Nye soon find themselves in the crosshairs of a pair of opportunists known as Burke and Hare. These unsavory characters will do anything to beat the competition for bodies. Even if it’s cold-blooded murder...
Exquisitely macabre and delightfully entertaining, The Resurrectionist combines fact and fiction in a tale of the risks and rewards of scientific pursuit, the passions of its boldest pioneers, and the anatomy of human desire.