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The Heart Specialist, by Claire Holden Rothman
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Set in Quebec at the turn of the 19th to 20th century, The Heart Specialist is the epic story of Agnes White, a lonely orphaned girl fascinated by the "wrong" things—microscopes, dissections, and anatomy instead of more ladylike interests—who rises to the status of one of the world's most celebrated pioneering women doctors. Not only does she break through patriarchal academic barriers; she masters the science of the human heart, becoming a scholar of international fame, all in a place and time inimical to intelligent women.
When Agnes is small, her father, a French-Canadian doctor living in Montreal, is charged with the murder of his handicapped sister. Although he is eventually acquitted, his reputation is ruined, and he flees, abandoning Agnes and her pregnant mother. Less than a year later, her mother dies of consumption, leaving Agnes and her baby sister Laure on their own. Agnes's sparse memories of her father have an abiding impact on her, and she is determined to find him, as well as to follow in his footsteps as a doctor, even though medical schools in Canada are closed to women at the time. She eventually gets her degree and finds a niche for herself as the curator of the McGill University pathology museum. But even as her professional star rises, her life is solitary and her happiness remains incomplete because of her missing father. One of the only clues in her quest to find him is a strange, misshapen heart that teaches her an invaluable lesson about love. Agnes ultimately must recognize that though she's a world-reknowned expert on the human heart, she still doesn't understand the her own.
Inspired by the career of Maude Abbott, one of Canada's first female physicians, The Heart Specialist is a novel about the mysterious, painful journey into selfhood.
From the Hardcover edition.
- Sales Rank: #919878 in Books
- Published on: 2012-06-05
- Released on: 2012-06-05
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 7.88" h x .83" w x 5.15" l, .75 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 336 pages
Amazon.com Review
My Sister the Doctor: Claire Holden Rothman on The Heart Specialist
Agnes White, the heroine of The Heart Specialist, is based on the real-life Maude Abbott. But as I wrote the novel, I needed to draw on sources more intimate than history to bring Agnes to life. Among the most important of these sources was my own sister, Dr. Ann Rothman.
Ann is not quite two years older than I am. For much of my childhood, she was my best friend. We spent countless hours together, sleeping in the same bedroom, eating at the same table, bathing in the same sudsy water and playing, endlessly, indoors and out. More than a friend, Ann was the person I admired most. She was brainy, hardworking and utterly untroubled by girly squeamishness. Being nearsighted, if she found something that interested her--a worm, a slug, a lizard--she was liable to give it an inquisitive sniff. And more often than not, she would discuss her discovery in minute detail over dinner that evening, taking it for granted that everyone at the table shared her passion for things that wriggled and squirmed and oozed.
Readers of The Heart Specialist will see my sister's intellectual vigor in my heroine. Like Ann, young Agnes is fearless in her quest for knowledge, memorably performing a do-it-yourself dissection in a freezing barn. She's also myopic; not above smelling the things she can only see mistily with her imperfect vision. And she's industrious. She has to be, to overcome the obstacles that stand between her and her goal of becoming a physician.
It's in those cruel obstacles, of course, that Agnes parts company from my sister. During the 1980's, Ann Rothman studied medicine at McGill--the very faculty that refuses Agnes in the novel. Ann never doubted for an instant that she could be fully a doctor and fully a woman at the same time. No such certainty is offered to Agnes. On the contrary, her fragile confidence is assailed again and again by a world that refuses to honor her dreams. Agnes must make her own way. Against all odds, she succeeds, mastering the intricacies of cardiac science even as she unlocks the secrets of her own vulnerable heart.
It's surely obvious to anyone who reads these words that Agnes is dear to me. Her ultimate quiet triumph is due, in large part, to the inspiration I've drawn from someone dearer still: my sister.
Review
"Told with precision, grace, and passion, The Heart Specialist is a beautiful, moving, utterly captivating novel about a woman who becomes one of Montreal's first female doctors. The writing is striking, the emotion immediate, the medical detail fascinating and the story compelling from the first page to the last. Claire Holden Rothman deserves a wide audience for this astounding literary achievement."
—Lawrence Hill, author of Someone Knows My Name
"I can pay a book no higher compliment than to say I didn't want it to end. With The Heart Specialist, I rationed my reading, permitting myself only a few chapters at a sitting so as to savour the writing and the story."
—Montreal Gazette
"[A]bly researched and written, with never an ungraceful sentence."
—Toronto Globe and Mail
“Rothman�has provided insight and perhaps gratitude in readers for those who paved the way.”
—Cleveland Plain-Dealer
“Quietly captivating, the tone of The Heart Specialist is reminiscent of English classics like Jane Eyre ... a tale of persistence, of dreams realized and dashed—it delivers on soft cat feet, and leaves one feeling satisfied and contemplative.”
—Missourian
“Brilliant first novel ... Rothman’s heartbreaking portrait of this trailblazer will long linger with the reader.”
—Publishers Weekly, Starred Review
"Based on the life of one of Canada's pioneering female physicians, Rothman's novel paints an arresting portrait of an indomitable yet vulnerable young woman."
—Booklist
“An epic that effortlessly navigates both complex medical concepts and the most basic human emotions…The Heart Specialist is a feminist-toned historical narrative that’s refreshingly unsentimental.”
—BUST Magazine
“Rothman clearly admires this early feminist pioneer, who overcomes tremendous male prejudice to establish a distinguished career in her own right.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“Writing with empathy and conviction, Rothman takes us through Agnes's pioneering journey.... Reading this book left me with immense respect for the brave women who were the first to break out of their strictures.”
—Reading the Past
From the Hardcover edition.
About the Author
Claire Holden Rothman is a Montreal writer and translator. After early training as a lawyer, she taught college literature and creative writing at McGill University. Rothman's short fiction has appeared in numerous literary periodicals. She has published two story collections, Salad Days and Black Tulips. Longlisted for Canada's prestigious Scotia Bank-Giller Prize, The Heart Specialist is a Canadian bestseller and will soon be released in Italy, Germany, the UK, and French Canada.
From the Hardcover edition.
Most helpful customer reviews
9 of 10 people found the following review helpful.
Outstanding.
By just kath
The inspiration for this book was taken from the life
and work of Dr Maude Elizabeth Seymour Abbot. She was one
of Montreal's first female physicians. This is not at all
the story of her life, but a novel that takes us along the
path with a woman of that time who wanted to become a physician.
Those were still the years when women were expected to make a home
for their men, and considered ill equipped or not intelligent enough
to consider more than minimal education. To think of those times now,
it seems impossible. We have women like Dr Abbot to thank for the
fact that women are now understood to be the equals of men.
Agnes White and her younger sister were being raised by their paternal
grandmother. But although her younger sister was quiet and considered
to be ladylike, Agnes was more inquisitive. She wanted to know how things
worked. Specifically, she was interested in the human body and even as a
child revered her father, who was a doctor. She had in face taken some
of his equipment for her own. In particular she took and hid away, a microscope.
She had quietly removed it from among her fathers belongings which her
grandmother had given away, long after the man himself had disappeared.
There was a scandal, but of course Agnes believed that all of the talk was
wrong, and that her father, Doctor Bourret was not guilty of the murder of
his sister. A happy circumstance of a new governess, who was herself well
educated, but that at the knee of her own father, is what helped to set Agnes
on the path to become a physician, herself.
This is a well told and extraordinary story of a women whose struggle
to enter medical school seemed to be blocked at every turn. Finding out if
she would prevail, was a more than worthy read.
I recommend this extraordinary book to men and women alike.
Anyone interested in history, or just a good strong story will
be glad to read The Heart Specialist.
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful.
Less Medicine, Feminism and Story than I Expected
By emmejay
Inspired by the early female-physician Maude Abbott, THE HEART SPECIALIST is the story of Agnes White: an orphan after her father, a prominent physician, disappears in mystery and disgrace and her mother dies; a budding anatomist at age 12, waiting for a squirrel to die so she can dissect it; a med-school student in Quebec's late-1800s male world of medicine. But unable to make a go of a clinical practice as a woman doctor, she finds her place as curator of anatomical specimens at McGill University's medical museum and begins to unravel her father's legacy and create her own.
The novel spans 1874 to 1919 and evokes the era (gender, WWI and bits about influenza). But Rothman tends to fast-forward past era-notable events (e.g. Alice is the first woman admitted to a medical school on one page, she's a practicing physician on the next, and her practice has failed a few pages later), while almost freeze-framing on more typical aspects (familial caregiving, romance and approval, the clerical features of Alice's job). Overall, it's an interesting read but never compelling; it sat untouched for many days when I was just 70 pages from the end.
4 of 5 people found the following review helpful.
Very well done!
By Charlotte Vale-Allen
I liked this book primarily because the author's research blends seamlessly into the narrative--a feat not often accomplished by writers trying to write period books endowed with an authentic feel. This novel is a success on that score. Everything feels natural - including the weather, the buildings, and downtown Montreal. The characters are all well-rounded and viable. In particular Agnes's evolving fascination with the heart feels just right. I had a bit of trouble with her relentlessly persistent, rather desperate faith in characters who didn't deserve it. That said, it's difficult as a contemporary female to read about a woman of yore and accept her thinking. However, having given the matter a week's worth of consideration after completing the book, I cannot fault the author. Agnes White lived in a meaner but simpler time. In fact, the book is well worth reading both from an historical viewpoint and also from a narrative one. Highly recommended.
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