The Pied Piper’s Poison

A haunting, profound novel, resonant at once of history and legend, The Pied Piper's Poison brilliantly resurrects seventeenth-century folklore in a wrenching quest for the roots of wartime atrocities in our century. It's winter, 1946, and strange things are happening at Tarutz quarantine camp in Southern Poland, where a group of refugees has fallen victim to a horrific, unidentifiable disease. A young doctor is sent to identify the mysterious affliction now working its way through a growing list of victims. And in the winter of 1648, the ancient town of Hamelin struggles to survive the most savage war Europe has ever known. Besieged by a vicious mercenary army, confounded by the endless machination of its leaders, and gripped by starvation, fever, and vermin, Hamelin is desperate for any respite. Is there a connection between these two calamities? A spiritually unsettling tale of ineluctable fates, cursed geographies, and the staying power of myth, The Pied Piper's Poison is an astonishing debut novel, rich in historical detail and penetrating in its insight into humanity's darkest suspicions.