I visited myself a few years ago, and before visiting I had not known that there was a dormant volcano in Edinburgh that people regularly climb. Now that is highly unfair, so let me say again here, I really like Sara Sheridan's female protagonists and I did enjoy this book very much. Edinburgh was a Hanoverian city but the spectre of Culloden and the Stuarts was still alive if only faintly, and 1822 is the year George IV visited the city.

We follow two women: one a courtesan and amateur perfume maker and one a botanical artist and lady's companion. McNab has more to lose than most, Elizabeth wants to capture the rare event with her art, and Belle… well, she is seeking the missing ingredient for a perfume so powerfully mystical it will secure her future.

It was also lovely to explore the connections in my home town – so much of the built environment in Edinburgh is still there, though the city boundary used to be at the Water of Leith. There is some really interesting biology throughout the story, both in terms of the plants depicted, and their properties. Sheridan succeeds in what very few have attempted before; in imagining early 19th century Edinburgh as a genuine if imperfect city of enlightenment, a thrilling, optimistic and romantic landscape where science flourishes, beauty is created, wrongs are righted, possibilities are infinite, and women can begin to dream, at last, of how it might feel to be free. Downstairs, she waits for Clementina, as the corseting on the old woman’s frocks takes a good twenty minutes to secure.

Aunque es una compañía poco recomendable por su profesión, es querida por sus sirvientes e invitada a numerosos eventos por su intelecto y carácter. com/thefairbotanists where I’m sharing lots of what I’ve found – Edinburgh history, biographies of interesting characters, botanical stories and the progress of the book. Well I’m excited cos I’m going on holidays this week and I’m taking Kirstin Innes’s Scabby Queen with me and I know I should have read it by now but somehow it just ended up far too far down my list. It longs for you to know, to understand, every single idea that ever crossed the author’s mind with regards to the plot (such as there is one), the setting, the character’s backstories, thought, and actions, and it is so anxious to ensure that not a single detail is missed that it tells you everything. These two very different women find a common bond, forming a friendship that defies society’s expectations .When newly widowed Elizabeth arrives in Edinburgh to live with her late husband’s aunt Clementina, she’s determined to put her unhappy past in London behind her. It didn’t take very long for the paths of the characters to cross – which is something I like in a book where there are many characters and stories.

I loved the bold brave women at its heart and was captured by the sense of their historical moment when different futures were becoming possible for those who dared to reach for them. Elizabeth hasn’t had a particularly happy marriage and this move promises to open up new experiences. The heroines are no-nonsense and although they want independent lives for themselves, they understand they must do so within what is possible at that time and place. We don’t share your credit card details with third-party sellers, and we don’t sell your information to others. And of course, I’m always interested in the women, so I was interested in looking at the way women interacted with the Garden as an institution, which was at the time part of the University of Edinburgh’s medical school.

In this pursuit, she meets Belle Brodie, a vivacious young woman with a passion for botany and the lucrative, dark art of perfume creation. I was first drawn towards it by its beautiful floral cover, adorned so prettily with various plants that I missed what was, in hindsight, a glaring red flag splashed across it. and Mhairi, a blind woman who is a whizz at whisky blending and might just be able to help Belle out. They've both faced adversity in their lives, yet they are able to use their circumstances to the best of their ability, and to overcome the difficult situations they've found themselves in. Set against some real historical events, and featuring important figures of the time, such as Sir Walter Scott, it’s a really fascinating read,which had me cheering on the female protagonists and some of the men who support them.