by Peg A: A Nurse’s secret is a murder mystery wrapped in a historical fiction. In the 1880’s Bellevue Hospital has become a training school for nurses following the principles of Florence Nightingale. At the same time a young woman, Una, is forced to live on the streets through unfortunate circumstances and is blamed for a murder. She cons her way into the training school as a way to avoid the police and determined to use the time to solve the murder and clear her name.
The story captures the time period in great detail. The doctors treat the nurses and trainees without respect and often harshly. Nurses and trainees work in terrible conditions and long hours. There is bigotry and big divide between classes with the poor and destitute often being discarded, dismissed or worse.
It is a well-written historical fiction and captivating. The only negative for me was that in parts the detail slowed the story.
