This really captured my interest at first but then quickly devolved into a 300 odd page Wikipedia article. It was a struggle to get through because the writing was just so plain and the author was just reciting facts and events without any kind of narrative. I will definitely give one of this authors more popular books a shot but this one just wasn’t for me.

While I love this author, this book was way too slow paced for me. I had a hard time finishing this book. The story is crazy, and since it happened so long ago it’s hard to have “proof” of stuff. The story was told ok. Just too much detail in some parts, so it felt like it dragged on. Still a crazy story though. I can’t believe all the stuff this lady did and got away with, even afterwards.

Gregg Olsen has an almost preternatural talent for discovering some of the most terrifying women in American history, and writing about them with a depth of feeling that conveys personal knowledge. Anyone with a passing interest in true crime won't want to miss this one.

In the early 1900s, two sisters are looking for a cure to their health problems and they find one in Dr. Linda Hazzard. Dr. Hazzard believes in a starvation program that will cure any illness. The sisters go to visit Dr. Hazzard and only one of them makes it out alive.

This book is hard to read because of the subject matter, but it is very well written. Olsen went into just the right amount of detail without being too long-winded. This true story will give you shivers with how disturbing it is.

Thank you to NetGalley and Thread Books for the ARC of Starvation Heights.

I had heard the story of Dr Hazzard and the fasting cure previously so I was definitely interested when I saw this -apparently new- book pop up on NetGalley.

First things first, it's not a new publication, which I always find a bit misleading in an ARC. I realised I had requested a novel by the same author only to find it was also a reissue, not to mention almost unreadable for me.

Although I was interested in the true events of this book, it was a struggle to persevere. I found the writing impenetrable at times and far too drawn out. I especially didn't like that there is a lot of what I can only imagine is invented dialogue, given the time this took place and the fates of some involved. I find too much dialogue like this blurs the line of fact and fiction.

In summary, a fascinating case but one which I'd recommend learning about from various podcasts than from this book.

Thank you, NetGalley for the chance to read this ARC.

Reading Starvation Heights by Gregg Olsen was a gripping and chilling experience. This true-crime book delves into the horrific story of Dr. Linda Burfield Hazzard and her “fasting treatment” that led to the death of several patients, including two British heiresses, Claire and Dora Williamson, in early 20th-century Washington.

Olsen’s meticulous research and compelling narrative style bring this disturbing case to life, making it feel like stepping back in time. The vivid descriptions and emotional depth keep you hooked from start to finish. The book effectively highlights the vulnerability of Hazzard’s victims and the terrifying reality of her methods.

If you tell was by far one of my most favorite reads but this one just didn't do it for me. I DNFed it I just couldn't get into it.

I've read a few different stories about this actual event and this one was by far the most detailed and realistic. This was a new to me author but he did an excellent job showing the details of what happened and i felt as though i was there. definitely a book I'm still thinking about.

This was a great book. I loved every paragraph, every sentence and every word of this masterpiece! I read it in 12 hours, which is a lot for me to do! It had everything and more laid out in the novel! I sure hope There is more to come from this author! I am totally hooked!

I started and kept this book down a couple of times. Though this book did not connect well with me, but I will give this book another try soon.

I think I enjoy listening to true crime books rather than reading them, but I finally made it to this one. Definitely a wild story! Not my favorite Olsen, but amongst them for sure!

This was so fascinating and well researched - I’d never heard of it before but the way that she ran the ‘therapy’ was insane and I was just entirely hooked

I don’t know what macabre sort of mood I was in when I decided to read Starvation Heights by Greg Olsen - gruesome and cruel are not my usual preferences, but medical non-fiction is.

Olsen has a gift for novelising non-fiction. He imagines the rustle of the wind through the leaves, the growling of stomachs, and so avoids stepping into a trap of dreary facts. (One does wonder, though, at which point such embellishments become excessive. Certainly the author cannot know that the sun shone just so, or how the floorboards creaked. If it makes the work more palatable to the layperson, is it permissible?)

By placing the Williamson sisters front and centre, Olsen provides protagonists to drive development of the narrative, and while their story is undoubtedly important - especially since it was instrumental in Linda Hazzard’s litigation - a closer look at the murderer herself may have provided more body to Starvation Heights. Even the British consul is better developed than Hazzard’s background. While nobody would dare suggest that the fraudulent doctor was not indeed a criminal and murderer, a book about a serial killer certainly calls for more background about the perpetrator. Instead, the reader is left to surmise her cold-heartedness based on her comments and lack of emotion in court, and her verbal abuse of her husband.

Through several chapters that tend towards repetition, the reader is treated to an example of bad American litigation not so different to courts today, and the very near-miss of the case’s very existence. As so often happens, Hazzard seems to come off lightly for her actions, not unlike the modern treatment of charlatan doctors when they find themselves on the defence. It may be worth noting that so-called “starvation cures” have managed to survive the intervening century in various iterations, and laypersons remain at the mercy of practitioners who are both charismatic and dangerous.

Starvation Heights is worthy of attention for the light it brings to medical negligence and fraud, and the interplays of time and place on these cases.

A chilling story about how people believed in long-term fasting back then and were manipulated in horrific ways for the gain of one narcissistic woman and her forsaken husband. What a read!

Thank you Netgalley and Thread Books for this arc in exchange for an honest review,

"Starvation Heights" by Gregg Olsen follows wealthy sisters Claire and Dora Williamson that take part in a fasting treatment with this Dr. Linda Hazzard who they had approached in her sanctuary during 1911.

I would give "Starvation Heights: by Gregg Olsen a 3-star review because, it is such a interesting story while horrifying at times, what was my compelling is the fact that this actually happened, I just felt that the story was too long and repetitive.

I cant say I enjoy a read by Gregg Olsen but I always learn something. His books are so well researched and I cant believe people do this. Really worth a read but it is very harrowing and not an easy read

I was given a free copy by netgalley and the publishers but the review is entirely my own.

This was a deeply sad and horrifying book regarding the true nature of families and parents. What we see on the outside doesn’t always reveal the inside.

Overall Starvation Heights was an okay read I found myself enjoying the first third of the books more than the last of it. It could have done with some better editing but you can tell a lot of research went into it.
2.5 stars rounded up to 3.
Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for a copy in exchange for an honest review.

Starvation Heights is a terrifying true story of one of the most horrific crimes imaginable by caregivers. It chronicles the ride and fall of a sanatorium that treated patients by extensive fasting. Participants went willingly to their death thinking this was a miracle cure fir all that ails the doctors patients if only they can indure. I found it horrific that this actually happened and the book is riveting a must read.

This book is well regarded and gets a lot of attenton. I can't say it's badly written. It's well written. I thought I would be engrossed. But for some reason it never grabbed me. I have nothing bad to say about the book. If you are interested in murder of the Pretty Poison variety, you may enjoy it. Excellent author.