FEATURED AUTHOR: ELIZABETH HUTCHISON BERNARD

I'm delighted to welcome Elizabeth Hutchison Bernard as the featured author in The Coffee Pot Book Club Blog Tour being held January 15th – 19th, 2024. She is the author of the Historical Mystery Suspense, The Beauty Doctor, the 2nd edition released by Black Rose Writing on January 4th, 2024 (327 pages).

Below are highlights of The Beauty Doctor,  Elizabeth Hutchison Bernard's author bio, and an excerpt from his book.

Tour Schedule Page: https://thecoffeepotbookclub.blogspot.com/2023/12/blog-tour-the-beauty-doctor-by-elizabeth-hutchison-bernard.html

HIGHLIGHTS: THE BEAUTY DOCTOR

 

THE BEAUTY DOCTOR: A NOVEL

By Elizabeth Hutchison Bernard

Audiobook narrator: Lisa Bozek

Blurb:

A Bone-Chilling Mystery-Suspense-Thriller Set in the Edwardian Era

Finalist, Eric Hoffer Book Award

"Beauty is power," Dr. Rome told her. "And with enough power, one can achieve anything."

Straightening noses, trimming eyelids, lifting jowls . . . In the year 1907, his revolutionary beauty surgery is considered daring, perhaps dangerous. Still, women want what Dr. Rome promises. Neither is his young assistant Abigail Platford immune to Dr. Rome's persuasive charm.

Abigail once dreamed of becoming a doctor, though of a much different sort. That dream ended with her father's tragic death from a medical error for which she holds herself responsible. Dr. Rome, who proudly displays his medical degree from Johns Hopkins, seems to believe in her. If he were willing to act as her mentor, might there still be a chance to realize her dream of someday becoming a doctor serving New York City's poor?

But something feels terribly wrong, as though an insidious evil is closing in. Broken promises, lies, and intrigues abound. The powerful are threatening to destroy the weak, and a doctor's sacred duty hangs in the balance. Abigail no longer knows who to believe; but with Dr. Rome now her mentor and her lover, she desperately wants to trust him.

Even when she discovers that one of their patients has mysteriously disappeared.

From bestselling author Elizabeth Hutchison Bernard, a suspenseful work of historical fiction grounded in the social and moral issues of the Edwardian era in America. Second Edition with Author's Preface.

Buy Links:

This title is available to read on #KindleUnlimited.

Universal Buy Link: https://books2read.com/u/316BAr

BOOK TRAILER: THE BEAUTY DOCTOR

 

AUTHOR BIO: ELIZABETH HUTCHISON BERNARD

 

Elizabeth Hutchison Bernard is the author of bestselling historical novels. Her 2023 release, Sisters of Castle Leod, is an Amazon Kindle #1 Bestseller (Historical Biographical Fiction, Historical Literary Fiction), winner of the 2023 Maxy Award for Historical and Adventure Fiction, and an Editors’ Choice of the Historical Novel Society. Her biographical novel Temptation Rag (2018) was hailed by Publishers Weekly as a “resonant novel . . . about the birth and demise of ragtime . . . in which romance and creative passions abound.” Elizabeth’s 2017 historical mystery-suspense-thriller, The Beauty Doctor, was a finalist for the prestigious Eric Hoffer Book Award. The book’s re-release (Jan. 4, 2024) features a stunning new cover and an Author Preface with insights into social and moral issues of the Edwardian era that frame this shocking fictional story set in the early days of cosmetic surgery. Before becoming a full-time author, Elizabeth was executive editor of an international aesthetic surgery journal, and senior consultant to the National Cosmetic Network in conjunction with Johns Hopkins University’s plastic surgery educational program. Learn more about Elizabeth and her books at www.EHBernard.com.

Author Links:

Website: https://www.ehbernard.com

Twitter: https://www.X.com/EHBernardAuthor

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EHBernardAuthor

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/EHBernardAuthor

Amazon Author Page: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Elizabeth-Hutchison-Bernard/author/B072N681MZ

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/16953486.Elizabeth_Hutchison_Bernard

EXCERPT: THE BEAUTY DOCTOR

 

Chapter Four

She contemplated, not for the first time, why a handsome professional man like Franklin Rome was unmarried. Recalling what he’d insinuated about Arthur, and how he claimed to have a pretty good eye for that kind of thing, she allowed herself a moment to consider whether Dr. Rome might himself have a hidden predilection. But no, that was impossible. She remembered the little flutter in her stomach that night at the banquet when he first smiled at her and then later, again, when he leaned close, saying she intrigued him. She couldn’t deny he was immensely attractive.

Unsettled by the direction of her thoughts, she reminded herself that Dr. Rome was her employer and a person from whom she might learn a great deal. Yes, he was a beauty doctor. But his credentials were impressive. That very afternoon she had helped him hang half a dozen framed diplomas on the wall of his private office, tangible proof of his training and competence. Even her father hadn’t so many certificates. Yet as Mr. Chapman had rather indelicately questioned the other night, why would a doctor waste the efforts of all that training on something as inconsequential as beauty surgery?

Certainly, it might be the money. Her father would have been lucky to make a hundred dollars in six months’ time. Most of his patients were poor; he not only treated them without thought of remuneration but often was forced to pay for the medicines they needed from his own pocket. Then she remembered how, at the Hennessys’ banquet, Dr. Rome had referred to the work of a doctor as the medical arts. That was it, of course! He did, in fact, strike her as the artistic type; more than once, she had admired the gracefulness of his long fingers, imagining them holding a blade—cutting and shaping human flesh, much like a sculptor molds clay. If Dr. Rome was a physician with the soul of an artist, it was understandable why he might become a beauty doctor.

She thought again of Isabelle Hadley and how her first success as Dr. Rome’s foil had given her an unexpected sense of pride. Already, she was embracing her new role with more enthusiasm than she’d anticipated. Why shouldn’t she? It was surely better than the awful dispiritedness that had plagued her since her father’s death. Besides, she enjoyed the sense of collegiality she shared with Dr. Rome. Yes, she was only an office girl, but he occasionally spoke to her about medicine and surgery and how far it all had come in recent years. She remembered how effusive he had become last week when the autoclave was delivered to the office. He’d explained in great detail about the steam sterilizer. It was one of the most important inventions of the late nineteenth century, he’d said. Many problems could be avoided by sterilizing instruments before they were used in patients. When he’d unpacked it from the crate, he’d told her how—

She threw off the comforter, every nerve in her body alert. The delivery! How could she have forgotten to tell Dr. Rome about the man who had stopped by the office after he’d left for the day?

Hastily, she lit the lamp, jumped out of bed, and began dressing, all the while replaying the conversation in her mind from late that afternoon. It had been awkward and very strange. She was locking up around five o’clock when a squat, unkempt little man appeared on the doorstep. Right away, she noticed his nose, which was large and misshapen, with a red, bulbous tip. Assuming he was a prospective patient, she gave him a card and instructed him to call the office in the morning for an appointment. With obvious impatience, he crumpled the card in his hand.

“You can’t get in touch with him?”

“Well, I might—”

“Yes or no.”

She didn’t answer, put off by his rudeness. Who was he to speak to her in such a manner?

“Just tell him Shark said to look for a delivery tonight, same time as before,” he said without waiting. “Got it?”

“What kind of delivery?”

“He’ll know. Tell him midnight, just like he wanted.”

“Midnight? Why, that’s ridiculous! Nobody makes deliveries at that hour.”

“Look, lady, I ain’t got time for parlor games. I make a lot o’ deliveries. The day ain’t long enough for all of ‘em, so I work late. The doc says he don’t mind. Just tell him, all right? And make sure you don’t forget.”

Pulling on her boots, she pictured again his dissipated look, the malicious twist to his lips, the wrinkled gray sack suit, and the shabby bowler perched precariously on his wide head. A shiver of revulsion ran through her. A rendezvous with such a fellow, alone and in the dark of night, was the last thing she wanted, but now there was no choice. She would conduct whatever brief transaction might be necessary and leave the delivery for Dr. Rome to find in the morning. He would never have to know how irresponsible she’d been in failing to inform him.

She went to the door and stepped outside. The stars, covered by a haze of clouds, provided only scant light, but the glimmer of electric street lamps made up for any deficit. She climbed the half dozen stairs from her room and then the short flight to the office entrance, unlocked the door, and entered. Inside was pitch-black. She felt her way to the desk and lit the lamp. Her eyes scanned the dim interior. The room in which she had grown accustomed to spending her days seemed somehow foreign at night, its sense of comfort reliant on sunlight streaming through the tall windows that now were shrouded in velvet drapery. She looked toward the dark hallway leading to the operating room and Dr. Rome’s private office and felt a vague apprehension, as if something sinister lurked beyond her small circle of light.

 

 

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