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I voluntarily reviewed a complimentary copy of this book which I received from the author. All views expressed are only my honest opinion.
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MY REVIEW:
Genre | Tropes: Historical Fiction, Mystery, Feminism
The foundation of this book takes the perspective of what it would look like if three women were the ones behind the writings of William Shakespeare. This has been a hot topic in the literary world, and combines the most supported idea that a woman named Emilia Lanier was the true author behind Shakespeare’s work and combines her with two other women.
Emilia Lanier Theory of Shakespeare
In The Shakespeare Secret we meet three seemingly inspired women. Jane, the theater house seamstress, Mary the Countess of Pembroke and Emelia a court musician. They meet each other in one charming evening and share their love of writing plays and storytelling. This begins their secretive journey of writing their own play in the confines of the church. Their goal is to go unnoticed in their strange meetings and complete their writings. But then they have the even bigger idea of handing their work off to someone Jane knows in the playhouse, William Shakespeare. Over time, their meetings are being noticed by one of the Queen’s spies and they are accused of plotting a coup against the Queen.
There were a lot of things that I loved about this story. In each of the main characters, there was a little more rawness to each of their personalities that was uniquely different from other historical fiction. These women were gritty, determined, and pushed aside a lot of their fear in a way that didn’t always feel accurate.
The way in which they were determined to reach their goals by stomping on expectations and blowing through conventions was really inspiring and I think this was the element of the story I enjoyed the most. No matter how dangerous it was for them to be doing what they were doing, they continued forward.
I thought some of the elements of the main drama, these women being accused of a plot against their Queen, could have been done a little better with something more at the end. The ending felt too gentle for where everything had built up to by that point. Leaving me feeling like I wanted a little bit more.
Overall, I enjoyed the story greatly and appreciated the perspective of this take on William Shakespeare and 16th Century London. The characters had many inspiring qualities and traits that had me thinking differently about women during this time. Strong willed women that were also on the brink of their own emotional collapse due to their own unique circumstances, but finds the strength to continue forward no matter how dangerous their life may be.
GET IT HERE:
Shakespeare is a woman—three women, in fact, who hire a footloose actor as the face of their writing. When they become suspects in a plot to kill Queen Elizabeth, their secret identity is suddenly at risk—along with the queen’s life—in this imaginative historical novel for fans of Hamnet and The Tower.
Everyone knows of William Shakespeare, the rakish former actor and famous playwright. But few know the three women writing every word of his plays: Mary Herbert, Countess of Pembroke, a frustrated poet; Emelia Bassano, a court musician with a passion for complex stories; and Jane Daggett, a seamstress with an impressive ability to spin fantastic plots. Frustrated by the patriarchal restrictions of their sixteenth-century society, they come together to write anonymously.
Soon the three women come under the scrutiny of one of the Queen’s spies, who notices their surreptitious meetings and odd behavior and suspects they are involved in an ongoing plot to kill the Queen. To help guard their secret as they face inquisition, they hire an actor named Will Shakespeare to be the face of their endeavor and divert attention.
As the plague deepens its grip on London and the Queen’s man traces their every move, the women are forced to choose between admitting what they’ve done and betraying each other to the Crown or hiding the truth at risk of endangering the Queen herself.
The Shakespeare Secret is a thrilling feminist tale of perseverance, justice, and freedom where friendship and trust are put to the test, for fans of Tracy Chevalier and Charlie Lovett.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
David Nix
Engineer by day and writer by night, David broke into traditional publishing in 2020 writing historical romance for Entangled Publishing under the pseudonym Sawyer North. In a stroke of luck, a photo of him wearing a cowboy hat on a Regency romance writers’ social media page landed him the opportunity to write a three-volume progressive western series for Sourcebooks in 2022. His love of researching history and bringing it to life – especially the stories of forgotten women – has led him lately toward writing historical fiction. He has a podcast in the works, Plot Twisted History, that tells true historical stories from a writer’s viewpoint – in service of the surprises and plot twists along the way.
David has called Austin home since 1998 with his wife and three children, where he fully embraces the city motto of “keep Austin weird.” He is a member of Regency Fiction Writers and Romance Writers of Central Texas, female centered organizations that have taken him under their wing and shared their collective wisdom.
Looking for book recs…
Adventures in Literature 
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