Dr Will Raven is a man seldom shocked by human remains, but even he is disturbed by the contents of a package washed up at the Port of Leith. Stranger still, a man Raven has long detested is pleading for his help to escape the hangman. Back at 52 Queen Street, Sarah Fisher has set her sights on learning to practise medicine. Almost everyone seems intent on dissuading her from this ambition, but when word reaches her that a woman has recently obtained...

"1853. In a city of science, discovery can be deadly. In a time of unprecedented scientific innovation, the public's appetite for wonder has seen a resurgence of interest in mesmerism, spiritualism and other unexplained phenomena. Dr Will Raven is wary of the shadowlands that lie between progress and quackery, but Sarah Fisher can't afford to be so picky. Frustrated in her medical ambitions, she sees opportunity in a new therapeutic field not already...