On November 7, 2000, Herbert West was reborn in my writing room. I was inspired by H.P. Lovecraft’s six serialized stories published in 1922 under the title “Herbert West, Reanimator.” Herbert is a compelling character, and I ended up writing his entire life story: four novels, in which a scientist obsessed with reversing death is transformed into a physician of last resort.
From ancient Arkham to the agony of the Great War, from Acadie to the islands of the West Coast, a brilliant but amoral physician is subjected to travails and entanglements, to become a source of healing — and of peril.
Book 1: The Friendship of Mortals
Herbert West can revivify the dead – after a fashion. He persuades Miskatonic University librarian and aspiring alchemist Charles Milburn to help him, but risks their friendship for the sake of his experiments. When West prepares to cross the ultimate border, only Charles can save his life — if his conscience lets him.
Book 1
Book 2: Islands of the Gulf Volume 1, The Journey, and Book 3: Islands of the Gulf Volume 2, The Treasure
Damaged by death and revivification, Herbert West renames himself Francis Dexter and leaves New England. His travels take him to Bellefleur Island, on the west coast of North America, where he becomes a country doctor and struggles with partial amnesia, irrational emotions, a difficult love affair and a healing power over which he has no control. Only when he surrenders to the unknown does he realize his true power.
Book 2
Book 3
Book 4: Hunting the Phoenix
Journalist Alma Halsey chases the story of a lifetime to Providence, Rhode Island and finds more than she expected – an old lover, Charles Milburn, and an old adversary, renegade physician Herbert West, living under the name Francis Dexter. Fire throws her into proximity with them both, rekindling romance and completing a great transformation.
Book 4
The complete series is also available as a “box set” (ebook only).
Here are readers’ reviews of the series
And at the following ebook stores:
The cover images for the four books of the series were designed by Alisha at Damonza.com.
Please note: the Supplements to the series (four short stories once available as single ebooks) are now part of the collection called Tales from the Annexe.
Audrey Driscoll's Blog 
Just posted a review for The Friendship of Mortals here: http://michelleproulx.wordpress.com/2013/04/23/book-review-the-friendship-of-mortals-by-audrey-driscoll/ — as you’ll see, I LOVED it!!! Fantastic job 🙂 I’m a huge fan!
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OH, DEAR GOD!!!!! I HAVE TO READ THESE!!!!
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Please do! Book 1 of the series, The Friendship of Mortals, follows HPL’s story quite closely. The other books take Herbert in quite a different direction — less gory, more psychological. Alchemy rather than anatomy, you could say. Thanks for the comment!
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Just finished Friendship of Mortals. I won’t post a review on Amazon, but all authors need to hear negative input.
First, I loved She Who Comes Forth. I can’t say the same here.
Second, when I first started writing I attended writing workshops all that I went to said: Show don’t tell. FoM is all tell. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, if the telling is compelling. I didn’t think West was that interesting and Charles was too bland and accepting of what West was doing. If West was the narrator and justifying his actions… Way too much description of non-essential details, too many meaningless conversations that didn’t advance the plot. Sorry if this observation bothers you, but that’s one of my pet peeves.
SWCF read really fast and kept my attention from the start. FoM took effort to keep at it. Normally I would give up after the first twenty pages, but since I loved FoM and you have a
West book set in Egypt that might be a good companion I stuck it out to the end. I’m hoping that the other books pick up the pace. It will be awhile as I’ve accumulated a number of other books to read while getting through this one.
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Thanks for your frank comments, Patrick, A chacun son gout. I wrote FofM in 2000 and 2001. Maybe I’ve upped my game since then. 😉
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Finished The Journey. Narrative wasn’t as stilted with the prose of Friendship making it easier to read. Part one with Andre narrating was rather tedious. I kept thinking, why did West kill himself? It wasn’t needed to start a new life looking like his old self. The mutiny on the ship added some action, but not enough.
Part two with Margaret was a little more interesting. Kind of an inside thing smirking at all the wrong assumptions she makes about Dr. Dexter. The slow emerging of Dexter’s past catching up to him adds a little conflict to the story. What was hinted at is in the open with Julian’s death. The ship wreck and how Dexter nearly died was interesting. The story is finally getting my attention. Normally I wouldn’t take this much energy and effort into a storyline like this.
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It’s good to hear you’re hanging in there, Patrick. 🙂
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