Resurrection Men

by T.K. Welsh

book data

23 ratings, 3.78 average rating, 8 reviews (more data...)

rating	frequency	%
5		21%
4		43%
3		26%
2		8%
1		0%

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published

April 19th 2007 by Dutton Juvenile

binding

Hardcover, 214 pages

isbn

0525476997 (isbn13: 9780525476993)

description

London, 1830s. Twelve-year-old Victor, an orphan, knows that life is dangerous, and death by disease or accident is common. But to Mr. Tipple and Mr. ...more

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other reviews (showing 1-20 of 37)

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08/03/07

Trevor rated it:

bookshelves: teen-lit-read

Read in May, 2007

While attending to the immediate medical needs of a young street urchin trampled by a nobleman’s carriage, Dr. Lambro tells the tale about a similar boy he once knew, named Victor. Victor, formerly of Modena, a London transplant, was cruelly orphaned and eventually sold into servitude as a street beggar. The dark, putrid, gray atmosphere of 1830s London is recreated here in vivid and sometimes brutal detail, accurately reflecting the environment of the era. While begging for his food and lodgi...more While attending to the immediate medical needs of a young street urchin trampled by a nobleman’s carriage, Dr. Lambro tells the tale about a similar boy he once knew, named Victor. Victor, formerly of Modena, a London transplant, was cruelly orphaned and eventually sold into servitude as a street beggar. The dark, putrid, gray atmosphere of 1830s London is recreated here in vivid and sometimes brutal detail, accurately reflecting the environment of the era. While begging for his food and lodging, he befriends other children in the Master’s keep: Nico, a fellow Italian, and Rebecca, a blind girl with a wisdom and understanding of the world beyond her few years. Along with the Master and the juvenile beggars are a duo, Tipple and Biggs. These are the Resurrection Men of the title: body snatchers who procure corpses for resale to the medical community, which happens to be experiencing a renaissance of sorts. The burgeoning field of medicine requires cadavers — the fresher the better — for surgeons to dissect and unlock the secrets contained within. The duo attempts to lure Victor into the macabre arts of grave robbing using salvation from the streets as the lure.

Welsh has incorporated gothic, mystery, and horror genres into a historical novel that is very readable. I made the mistake of attempting to eat macaroni salad while reading the vivid description of the Smithfield district, complete with the putrifacted animal carcasses, rotting fat, skins strewn about, blood spraying, walking ankle deep in gore, and all other manner of butchery by-products. The feel of the language of the time has been maintained without getting bogged down in exact replication — the cockney of Tipple and Biggs is explained by Victor — fact is the language is as foreign to him, being Italian, as it is to some of us reading the book as modern English speakers. The action and pace is steady and quick, rarely pausing, and finishes in an unforgettable, movie-quality fight-to-the-death.
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06/17/07

Ben W. rated it:

bookshelves: ya

Read in April, 2007

A chilling portrait of 1830s London, when corpses were highly valued for medical research, and the streets of London were filled with homeless children. The fresher the subject, the more valuable the cadaver. Eventually, someone realized it was easier to kill the children, than to dig them up after death.

The book follows the troubles of Victor, from his home in Italy where he witnesses the murder of his parents as Carbonari, to the muck-filled streets of London where he's sold to a...more

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12/07/07

Krista the Krazy Kataloguer rated it:

bookshelves: read-ya

Read in December, 2007

This odd novel reminded me of the rags-to-riches and the picaresque types of stories. The main character went through a lot of adventures and suffering to end up in a good position. The description of the beggar subculture and the state of surgery at the time was fascinating. For a closer look at the beggar culture, and their language, see A Pickpocket's Tale by Karen Schwabach.

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05/11/08

Jennifer Wardrip rated it:

bookshelves: trt-reviews

Reviewed by Christian C. for TeensReadToo.com

1830, Modena, Italy. 12-year-old Victor returned to his home and had to watch with horror the cruel murder of his parents by three Tyrolean soldiers. The reason? They were Carboniaris, a group of revolutionaries that fought to keep Italy united.

After the massacre, the soldiers sold Victor as a cabin boy to the Chief Mate of the Ceres, a ship that was about to set sail. The ship departed from Italy, and sailed along the Mediter...more Reviewed by Christian C. for TeensReadToo.com

1830, Modena, Italy. 12-year-old Victor returned to his home and had to watch with horror the cruel murder of his parents by three Tyrolean soldiers. The reason? They were Carboniaris, a group of revolutionaries that fought to keep Italy united.

After the massacre, the soldiers sold Victor as a cabin boy to the Chief Mate of the Ceres, a ship that was about to set sail. The ship departed from Italy, and sailed along the Mediterranean coast through the Strait of Gibraltar. It sailed past the coasts of Portugal, northern Spain, and France.

One day, in the middle of a big storm, Victor climbed up the mainmast, all the way to the topgallant, trying to escape from a crew member whom he had accused of stealing food. But as the seaman drew closer, Victor lost his footing, fell on the deck, and crushed his leg completely. The Chief Mate didn't think twice: "A cabin boy who cannot walk is of no value to this ship.... Throw him overboard." Which he did.

Clinging to a gaff, Victor drifted in the middle of the sea for several days, until he arrived at the coast of England. He was rescued by an old man and his dog. The old man treated his leg, fed him, and taught him how to speak English and fight with his crutch.

After a few months, the old man couldn't afford to keep Victor any more and, once again, Victor was sold. This time to Tipple and Biggs, two unscrupulous men who took Victor to London, by hiding him in a coffin with a decaying body.

In London, Victor lived in a house full of children and animals. He was forced to beg in the streets during the day. Life in London at that time was difficult: jobs were scarce, health conditions were deplorable, the streets were full of excrement and mud; people were dying of cholera. Victor soon discovered that there was a black market for dead bodies and body parts. Doctors wanted to study the human body and were willing to pay high amounts of money for them. People like Tripple and Biggs met the demand, and were willing to do anything for a few guineas, including digging up corpses, kidnapping, selling, or even killing someone. Victor found out that Tripple and Biggs were after some of his friends, and he decided that he had to reveal the mastermind of this wicked market and put an end to it.

RESURRECTION MEN is an intense, dark work of historical fiction that made me read every page intently to the end, while trying to cope with the knot of sadness and anguish that I had in my stomach. T. K. Welsh's rich vocabulary and detailed descriptions, where almost no noun goes without an adjective, transported me to the streets of London, and made me smell the putrid odors of the city, live the horrors of the children's lives, witness the horrid dissections of the dead bodies, and hear the unsettling noise of the broken bones.

When I finished the novel, I was looking forward to reading the section at the end of the book that explained which historical facts of the book were real, but unfortunately, there was none.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who likes historical fiction and is interested in learning more about an unfortunate time in the history of medicine and the city of London. But if you're looking for a fun, happy read, this may not be it! (less)

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09/08/07

Jan rated it:

bookshelves: horror-fiction, teenbooks

Read in September, 2007

This one is not for the faint of heart. The setting is London in the 1830s. Twelve-year-old Victor, an orphan, knows that life on London streets is dangerous, and death by disease or accident is common. But to Mr. Tipple and Mr. Biggs, these are streets teeming with possibility, where a child, once dead, is a valuable commodity for doctor's experiments, and a corpse can fetch as much as nine guineas. In this dark underworld, Victor must uncover the identity of the ghoulish murderer who is at th...more

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10/12/08

Terry rated it:

I was first attracted to the red and black cover, with the eerie picture. The book jacket description sounded interesting, too -- body stealing in 19th century England. But the book is far more complex than that, with a lot going on. I do not think the book jacket information adequately described what the book was about. There are several disturbing scenes, but the book is reasonably satisfying if you can get through them. Given the blood, grime, and gore, this book should fly off the shelv...more

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01/28/08

Cat rated it:

bookshelves: young-adult

Read in February, 2008

A great book for boys. The story takes place in the 1830's in London. Victor is a beggar on the streets trying everything he can to survive, when a friendly Doctor finds him and takes him in. Things start to turn sour for Victor when his friends start to disappear and he is left with their fate in his hands.

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06/19/08

Meaghan rated it:

bookshelves: childrens-young-adult-fiction, historical-novels, read-in-2008

A beautifully told and spellbinding tale of an outcast in the London underworld of the 1830s. I can't help but wonder if the author drew inspiration from the nonfiction book The Italian Boy; the similarities are too many to ignore.

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