To be frank, the format of this book with it's strange chapters was not appealing. I would have loved more of a developing story whether it's non fiction or not. When I was interested the writing was really good and painted a grim picture of life in the New England colonies of 1738.

This is more of 1.5.

This book tries to make interesting a case of attempted murder by poison in 18th century Newport, but it fails short. The author is firmly in between writing a dissertation on the topic and writing a fictional mistery, and it doesn't work.
It's a pity, because the writing style is very enjoyable and quite funny: I would be interested in reading more from this author, because I feel it's more a topic problem.