Book Review: The Poisoner’s Handbook

[Isa Vestal]

Title: The Poisoner’s Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Medicine in Jazz Age New York
Author: Deborah Blum
Series: not
Genre: Non-fiction, scientific
Reading level: late high school, early college.

I actually started reading this book as a requirement for High School Summer Reading but found myself enraptured with it and finished the whole book in a matter of a day. The general premise of “The Poisoner’s Handbook” is a nonfictional look at the different ways toxicologists and forensic scientists in 1920s New York found ways to examine a body. Though the description sounds gory and not very HOL-appropriate, I found that the text material itself discussed more about the scientific discovery over the actual state of the bodies. Because of this, I’d say it wasn’t particularly graphic in nature but would still probably advise those who are squeamish about anatomy or death to avoid the book.

I found it to be a very interesting and informative on the subject of forensic science and the developments that the field of study took which have gone on to shape modern-day forensics. There wasn’t a continuous storyline from chapter to chapter as a few different New York scientists came to their own separate conclusions and used their own forensic methods but it still provided me with compelling and fact-packed biographical accounts of said scientists.

I’m not personally all that into reading non-fiction books so I thought this would be a bore to read but, surprisingly, I found it quite engaging. Though the story was factual, each chapter mainly which focused on a different chemical (for example, one chapter focused on cyanide, one focused on chloroform, etc.) followed the storylines of a pair of scientists who made discoveries and built on each other’s ideas to form the knowledge we have about toxins today. I liked seeing the journeys and experimentation each scientist conducted and the book broke down chemical properties and how they affected the body in an easy-to-understand way. If there are any other true crime buffs out there, I’d totally recommend this book but it’s definitely not for everyone.