Synopses & Reviews
From the author of
Chatterton and
Shakespeare: A Biography comes a gripping novel set in London that re-imagines an infamous 19th-century Shakespeare forgery.
Charles and Mary Lamb, who will in time achieve lasting fame as the authors of Tales from Shakespeare for Children, are still living at home, caring for their dotty and maddening parents. Reading Shakespeare is the siblings' favorite reprieve, and they are delighted when an ambitious young bookseller comes into their lives claiming to possess a "lost" Shakespeare a play. Soon all of London is eagerly anticipating opening night of a star-studded production of the play not knowing that they have all been duped by charlatan and a fraud.
Review
"The ale houses, antiquarian bookshops, and seedy south side of Shakespeare's London come to life in Ackroyd's richly atmospheric tale, which entertainingly mixes the bawdy with the brainy." Library Journal
Review
"[E]ntertainment for serious Anglophiles." Kirkus Reviews
Review
"Ackroyd very effectively delivers to us the city in all its cramped and noisy splendor....But what makes this book particularly gratifying is that Ackroyd also knows something about life." Christian Science Monitor
Review
"Ackroyd does not entertain us at the expense of mood and character; the novel mixes wit with warmth." Boston Globe
Review
"[A] clever and enthralling piece of entertainment." Minneapolis Star Tribune
About the Author
Peter Ackroyd (CBE) is a master of the historical novel: The Last Testament of Oscar Wilde won the Somerset Maugham Award; Hawksmoor was awarded both the Whitbread Novel of the Year and the Guardian Fiction Prize; and Chatterton was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. His most recent historical novels are The Clerkenwell Tales, The Trial of Elizabeth Cree, Milton in America, and The Plato Papers.