Wickett's Remedy

Wickett's Remedy is a 2005 historical novel^[1] by Myla Goldberg, about the 1918 influenza epidemic. It was published by Doubleday.

The novel makes heavy use of annotations, marginalia, and false documents to support its premise;^[2] Goldberg has stated that Vladimir Nabokov's Pale Fire was a major influence on her in this respect.^[3]

Plot

In 1918 Boston, Lydia Kilkenny is a sales clerk who marries medical student Henry Wickett. When Henry, and most of her relatives, die of the "Spanish flu", Lydia becomes a nurse, and works to help find a cure by assisting in medical experiments on convicted Navy deserters. She also continues to sell Henry's patent medicine (the Remedy of the title)^[4] until Henry's business partner repackages it as a soft drink.^[5]

Reception

In the New York Times, Andrea Barrett described it as "ambitious", "thoroughly researched", and "admirable", with "a set of nightmarish, wonderfully well-written chapters that would have made a strong short novel all on their own", but felt that it was a "somewhat uneasy mixture" of emotional fiction and historical fact; as well, Barrett considered that the novel's sheer scope and "kaleidoscopic narrative" worked to its detriment.^[4] The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette felt it was "too ambitious", but a "heartening example of ... risk-taking" on Goldberg's part, emphasizing that the novel was nonetheless "very readable", and that Goldberg had included "powerful imagery, succinct prose and unabashed sensitivity".^[6]

The Seattle Times considered the book "well-researched" but "somewhat elusive and not entirely satisfying", comparing it unfavorably to Goldberg's earlier work Bee Season.^[7] Salon described it as "historically credible," and stated that "the real reason to read" the novel is "the chance to spend a few hours" with Lydia.^[5]

References