This Dark Endeavor

This Dark Endeavor is a young adult novel by the Canadian writer Kenneth Oppel, published in 2011. It is the first of his books about the young Victor Frankenstein, and it takes place long before the experiments that made the name famous.

Victor and his twin brother Konrad are sixteen, growing up in the family chateau in the independent republic of Geneva with a private library and an unusual education. When Konrad falls gravely ill and the physicians can do nothing useful, Victor goes looking for a different answer. In the family's hidden collection, the Biblioteka Obscura, he finds a reference to the Elixir of Life described in an ancient text, and he decides that he will be the one to make it. The hunt that follows involves a disreputable alchemist, dangerous ingredients and the willing help of his cousin Elizabeth and their friend Henry, all of whom have reasons to worry about what Victor is turning into.

Oppel writes the book as the origin of the ambition that will define Victor Frankenstein later, and he sets it in a Europe where alchemy is treated as a serious subject rather than a joke. A second volume, Such Wicked Intent, continues the story.