An extraordinary biography. A gallery of astonishing work. The legacy of a madman.

Philadelphia, the late 1870s. A city of gas lamps, cobblestone streets, and horse-drawn carriages-and home to the controversial surgeon Dr. Spencer Black. The son of a grave robber, young Dr. Black studies at Philadelphia's esteemed Academy of Medicine, where he develops an unconventional hypothesis: What if the world's most celebrated mythological beasts-mermaids, minotaurs, and satyrs-were in fact th...