The Poisoner's Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York

Equal parts true crime, twentieth-century history, and science thriller, The Poisoner's Handbook is "a vicious, page-turning story that reads more like Raymond Chandler than Madame Curie" (The New York Observer)

A fascinating Jazz Age tale of chemistry and detection, poison and murder, The Poisoner's Handbook is a page-turning account of a forgotten era. In early twentieth-century New York, poisons offered an easy path to the perfect crime. Science had no place in the Tammany Hall-controlled coroner's office, and corruption ran rampant. However, with the appointment of chief medical examiner Charles Norris in 1918, the poison game changed forever. Together with toxicologist Alexander Gettler, the duo set the justice system on fire with their trailblazing scientific detective work, triumphing over seemingly unbeatable odds to become the pioneers of forensic chemistry and the gatekeepers of justice.

In 2014, PBS's AMERICAN EXPERIENCE released a film based on The Poisoner's Handbook.

• The Poison Squad: One Chemist's Single-Minded Crusade for Food Safety at the Turn of the Twentieth Century
• The Disappearing Spoon: And Other True Tales of Madness, Love, and the History of the World from the Periodic Table of the Elements
• Napoleon's Buttons: How 17 Molecules Changed History
• Periodic Tales: A Cultural History of the Elements, from Arsenic to Zinc
• The Violinist's Thumb: And Other Lost Tales of Love, War, and Genius, as Written by Our Genetic Code
• American Fire: Love, Arson, and Life in a Vanishing Land
• Down City: A Daughter's Story of Love, Memory, and Murder
• The Mystery of the Exploding Teeth: And Other Curiosities from the History of Medicine
• Caesar's Last Breath: And Other True Tales of History, Science, and the Sextillions of Molecules in the Air Around Us
• Ethan of Athos