|
|
Books For Youth - Fiction - Historical Fiction
|  |  | 
Shakespeare’s Daughter.
Hassinger, Peter W. (author).
Apr. 2004. 320p. HarperCollins/Laura Geringer, hardcover, $15.99 (0-06-028467-6); library edition, $16.89 (0-06-028468-4). Grades 7-12.
REVIEW.
First published March 1, 2004 (Booklist).
Susan Cooper’s King of Shadows (1999) and J. B. Cheaney’s The Playmaker (2000) imagined Shakespeare at work. This absorbing story about Shakespeare’s eldest daughter presents the playwright in a new role--Shakespeare as dad. Fourteen-year-old Susanna Shakespeare is a passionate singer, but society leaves few options for female “choristers.” Determined to pursue music, Susanna flees the home to join her father in London. An epic story unfolds, in which Susanna discovers the thrill of performance, her first crush, and her father’s infidelity as she unwittingly becomes involved in a dangerous political plot. The story relies on far-fetched coincidences, and Hassinger’s rich prose, sprinkled with Elizabethan one-liners, includes some exalted descriptions of music as well as the complicated religious and political intrigue, which may slow some readers. But this involving mystery offers fascinating insight into women’s realities in Shakespeare’s time, and many readers will recognize Susanna’s struggles to reconcile family secrets and her father’s betrayals. With an assortment of historical figures making appearances, an author’s note separating fact and fiction would have been welcome. — Gillian Engberg
| |
|
| Click here to find more books by this author |
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|