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Summary
Summary
To the outside world, Tom Pryne is an orphan traveling Elizabethan England with his uncle's theater troupe. In actuality, "Tom" is Viola, in disguise because her parents' Catholic sympathies have put them at odds with the law and forced them into hiding. When the actors arrive in the sleepy little town of Stratford-on-Avon, Viola's uncle is arrested for murder, and she joins forces with Will Shakespeare, a local boy with a penchant for trouble and a smart turn of phrase, to uncover the real culprit.
Author Notes
Bailey MacDonald is a professional actress and playwright who lives near Atlanta, Georgia. When she is not writing, she performs under a different name with a theater group in that city. Bailey has always loved theater, and when she began to write her first historical mystery, it was a natural choice to select Stratford-on-Avon, the home of the great William Shakespeare, as the setting for a tale of trickery, murder, and detective work.
Reviews (4)
School Library Journal Review
Gr 5-7-Young Viola is masquerading as a boy so that she can travel with impunity with her Uncle Matthew's strolling players. When the troupe arrives in Stratford, 11-year-old Will Shakespeare drives them to distraction with his incessant questions. He promises to keep Viola's identity secret, however, and, when Matthew is falsely accused of murder, Will devises numerous plans-all of which fail-to try to prove the man's innocence. The tale concludes with a dramatic finish-dead bodies all around-in the best tradition of Shakespearean tragedy. Each of the brief 21 chapters begins with the "nut" of a Shakespearean quote, and some readers might recognize bits of dialogue from various plays. The chapters themselves logically reveal the twists and turns of the plot in concise, readable prose. The realistic details put flesh on the bones of not only the primary characters, but also of the secondary personages as well. The joy here, of course, is in seeing the boy Will through the eyes of Viola, a protagonist who views him not with wonder but with disdain. She does admit to his talents, however: his cleverness, his love of intrigue, and his poetic prowess. MacDonald's debut novel is sure to entice readers, both as a story in its own right and as a prompt to explore the life and career of the most famous writer in the English language.-Nancy Menaldi-Scanlan, formerly at LaSalle Academy, Providence, RI (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Horn Book Review
Viola (disguised as a boy) travels with a troupe of actors until her uncle is falsely accused of murder in Stratford. Fortunately, an incorrigible young Will Shakespeare intervenes to help solve the crime and reveal the real villain. Though this tale of Elizabethan mystery and adventure is light on character development and suspense, it's richly dressed in Shakespearean phrases, character names, and diverting plot contrivances. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. All rights reserved.
Kirkus Review
Some nearly threadbare tropes hold together this fast-paced mystery for middle schoolers, only fraying completely at the end. Will Shakespeare at 12 is irrepressible, full of words and perhaps a little ADHD. His foil is Tom, a member of a group of players, except that Tom is really Viola, living in disguise with her uncle's troupe as her parents are in hiding for helping a Catholic priest escape the Crown. Tom/Viola's uncle and his players come to Stratford-on-Avon, where he is almost immediately accused of murder when a local curmudgeon is bludgeoned to death with the uncle's walking stick. Will, with the unwilling assistance of Tom/Viola, seeks to solve the crime, full of words and scheming and hijinks. The townsfolk spout lines that ring suspiciously familiar, a melodramatic plot twist involving the twin sons of the local curmudgeon ends in a drowning and suicide (offstage) and everyone seems to figure out that Tom is really Viola. Lively and quick, it may offer some small amusement to readers not quite ready for King of Shadows. (Historical fiction. 8-11) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
Thirteen-year-old Viola, disguised as a boy, joins her uncle's troupe of traveling players and arrives in Stratford, where she meets a lively 12-year-old named Will Shakespeare. When a local man is murdered and her uncle is imprisoned as a suspect, Viola and Will join forces. Hoping to startle a confession from the supposed murderer, Will hatches a dramatic trap in which Viola, disguised as a ghastly ghost, delivers lines written by Will in iambic pentameter. Most young readers will not catch the occasional allusion to Shakespeare's plays, but they will enjoy the murder mystery, the vivid Elizabethan setting, and the clearly drawn characters. The story moves along at a good pace, with twists and turns enough to keep mystery fans pleasantly baffled. Although there are plenty of historical novels in which the adult Shakespeare takes a role, few manage to make him as believable as this portrayal of young Will, full of curiosity, mischief, and words, words, words. --Phelan, Carolyn Copyright 2009 Booklist
