Book Review: Murder By Degrees by Ritu Mukerji

Being a female doctor in late 1800s Philadelphia is not for the faint of heart, but Dr Lydia Weston finds fulfillment, if not outright courage, in doing this very necessary work. As a professor and anatomist, she spends almost as much time teaching as she does tending to the sick. She takes quiet satisfaction not only in her ability to help the ill, but also in ensuring that other women are taught well in how to do the same. 

Her work does not, however, come without opposition, usually from the ignorant and condescending:

She had faced so many men like Harper, those who doubted her intelligence at every turn. Usually she would shrug it off, persuading herself that focusing on insults would detract from the work. But not today. She thought of her students and the devastating hardships so many of them had overcome. She thought of her early days in Philadelphia, filled with self-doubt as to whether she would finish her degree. Even now, after more than ten years of practice, there was the need to prove herself over and over again. There was no denying the personal toll extracted by all the years of struggle.

Detractors she can handle. A brand new sort of challenge arrives, however, when a patient of hers goes missing. Anna Ward is a bright young woman who’d gone into service in order to support her ailing younger brother. While she first came to Lydia as a patient, the two have since struck up a genuine friendship, with Lydia often loaning the younger woman books and discussing with her matters both medical and philosophical. Lydia becomes concerned as to her friend’s well-being when Anna misses several of their appointments in a row.

Even so, she’s utterly shocked when a body identified as Anna’s is fied out of the Schuylkill River. Lydia is soon pulled into the police investigation led by the thoughtful Inspector Thomas Volcker, whose primary assistant, Sergeant Charlie Davies, is suspicious of her involvement. This isn’t due to any suspicions of foul play on her part, but because he simply can’t understand that a woman could be not only a doctor but an asset to crime fighting. Volcker must patiently remind him:

“But let us give Dr. Weston an opportunity to work and not tear down her efforts completely. I once did the same for you, Charlie.”

 

Davies flushed. Volcker’s words stung, hitting the mark with accuracy. In his early days on the force, Davies had been relegated to patrol the beat in the tenement he had grown up in. He had chafed at the drudgery, longing to be part of a detective’s team. But it was clear there was little hope of advancement; he lacked education and his only qualification was an eagerness to learn[…] None of the inspectors had been willing to take him on except Volcker. Volcker could be critical and demanding, but he was never condescending.

With this somewhat uneasy alliance, Lydia must bring her formidable mind to bear on the conundrum of what happened to Anna. Clues seem to lie in a diary Anna left behind, filled with cryptic passages of poetry. As Lydia, Volcker and Davies interview the people who’d most often and closely interacted with Anna, they can’t help but wonder whether the young woman had become involved in something so terrible that she needed to be permanently silenced. And worse, will Lydia become the killer’s next victim when she gets too close to the truth?

This engaging historical mystery features a spirited heroine ready to tackle just about any problem set in her path, using her empathy, keen wit and ingenuity to not only carry the day but to win over—or at least neutralize—those who might oppose her. Ritu Mukerji has clearly done her research as she brings the 19th century and the cutting edge medical technology of the time to life. With fillips of poetry to go with the gaslit crimes, this novel is a must read for fans of the genre.