A Brief Guide to William Shakespeare without the Boring Bits

I don't agree with the title, but it's mainly because I don't particularly care for Peter Ackroyd's writing style.  He gives a pretty good overview to all of Shakespeare's plays (grouped by category) and reprints all the sonnets with a brief introductory chapter.  The result is a passable commute book (one that can be read in 5-20 minute snatches over the course of a week or so), but not a particularly engrossing or memorable book.  Ackroyd's analyses of the plays left my mind almost immediately, unlike Sr. Maureen Christi's dissection of "Romeo and Juliet."  Decades after 9th grade, I still remember what she had to say about the fickle teenagers.

The Pale Companion

I pulled The Pale Companion off my shelf as I was nearing the end of my annual book diet.  I read an earlier (the first?) book in the series nearly a decade ago and remember it as enjoyable but not particularly gripping.  That's also my assessment of The Pale Companion; a decent mystery but not one that left me desperate to hunt down the rest of the out-of-print series.

The Chamberlain's Men are traveling to an estate near Salisbury where they will perform "A Midsummer Night's Dream" the night before the ceremony.  Along the way, company member Nick Revill ends up on the wrong end of a riot and meets local magistrate Adam Flemming whose daughter Kate tends to Nick's bruises.  Due to the Theory of the Conservation of Characters, we know that the Flemmings will be guests at the wedding, and that (since this is a mystery), Adam Flemming will be charged with solving it.  And we are not disappointed - we even get a bonus murder.  The first death is that of Robin, a feral woodsman found hanging from a tree.  His murder has not been solved when, the night after the performance, someone kills Lord Elcombe with a gnomon.  His elder son, Henry (the groom to be) appears to have killed him, but has he?  Phillip Gooden creates a good puzzle, giving strong motives to the innocent and supporting his slightly improbably conclusion.  I'll give The Pale Companion a middling grade - worth reading, but perhaps not worth searching for.

1599: A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare

1599:  A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare never fully captured my attention, but it did make me want to watch and read the four plays mentioned.  I think it was because of Shapiro's writing style - clear but not engrossing.

Shapiro divides his book into four seasons, picks a play for each one, and then puts that play into the context of Shakespeare's world.  Winter focuses on *Henry V* and how it reflects the English campaign in Ireland.  Spring draws parallels between *Julius Caesar* and the highly structured court of the day.  Since Shakespeare traveled to Stratford-on-Avon that summer, *As You Like It* plays out against the backdrop of Shakespeare's attainment of a coat of arms.  Finally, melancholy *Hamlet* plays out against the backdrop of an aging queen, a looming succession crisis, and the first tentative steps into empire building.  Shapiro does a nice job placing Shakespeare in context, but ultimately it's not a particularly memorable book.