Reviews

"[A] fascinating exploration of the life of James Barry, a British doctor who, as [Rachel] Holmes shows, was one of the leading and most controversial innovators of nineteenth-century medicine . . . As compelling as the life it describes."
--"Publishers Weekly
"Freud would have had a field day with James Barry. . . . [Scanty Particulars is] a fascinating depiction of the Victorian era."
--"Kirkus Reviews
"From time to time a truly original piece of research comes to life. Scanty Particulars is not only a wonderful read; it captures the essence of one of the most enigmatic characters of the nineteenth century. The fabulous Dr. Barry is once again the center of speculation."
--Amanda Foreman, bestselling author of" Georgiana: Duchess of Devonshire
"James Barry is the kind of character you think must have been dreamed up in an exotic collaboration between Joseph Conrad and Oscar Wilde. Rachel Holmes's Scanty Particulars is admirable and dramatic history, and suggests as well a subtle fable of colonialism and its discontents."
--Ron Rosenbaum, author of "Explaining Hitler and" The Secret Parts of Fortune
"At last, that fascinating but nebulous figure James Barry has found the perfect historian. Impeccably researched and written with spirit, Scanty Particulars is more than a biography of an extraordinary person; it is an anatomy of Victorian sexuality."
--Roy Porter, author of "The Greatest Benefit to Mankind
"This clever and engaging book tells a fascinating story, and raises some vexing questions on gender as the disputed territory where physiology and ideology blur."
--Jeanette Winterson, "The Times (London)