I received this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

This book is fascinating - the human race has had some really odd and rather disgusting ideas over the years. A medically based non-fiction book like this can be pretty dry, but Kang & Pedersen add humour that keeps the book going at a steady clip. Some of the jokes border on corny, but seem to fit with the weird content!

Quackery is well researched and well written, with great illustrations and side notes throughout. My copy is an ARC, so it's in black & white without image captions - but the final version is in colour. I'd like to grab a finished copy, because I really want to see the full-colour images and captions! Each chapter also ends with a modern medical update. We still surprisingly use quite a few creepy and strange things in modern medicine.

If you're looking for a book to read to get in the Halloween spirit, Quackery would be a great choice.

5 stars. Amazing. This beautiful book is a prequel to ‘Practical Magic’, and the two tie together quite nicely. This time we’re following the lives of the aunts and their little brother Vincent as they navigate love, grief and everything in between. The world Hoffman has built is stunning and the characters are nuanced, flawed and very realistic. As soon as I had finished the book, I wanted to dive right back into it again. I think it’s definitely time to give ‘Practical Magic’ another spin as well.

4 stars! First of all, the design of this book is amazing - it looks just like an Ikea catalogue. Each chapter even starts with an ad for a piece of furniture, although they get progressively more disturbing as the story goes on. Horrorstor is a ghost story; Orsk (an Ikea rip-off) is experiencing vandalism at night, and some of the staff decide to stay over to investigate. Cue gruesome craziness. Overall the story is solid, and it was really easy to picture the action. It would make a great movie, although I did feel like it ended a bit too quickly. A sequel would be awesome too!