My first impression on looking at the front cover was that the book was a pretty typical historical novel: overpowering Gothic font on a burnished parchment-effect background. I've had this book for a while and only turned to it when I had run out of all other reading material. But although this book wasn't exactly groundbreaking, there is definitely something that sets this book apart from any other historical novel. Firstly, the main character is a certain John Shakespeare. Now I know what you're thinking - he's probably got nothing to do with the actual famous Shakespeare. Wrong! The book is set in Elizabethan England and John Shakespeare is the brother of ...  Read the complete review

The Tudor murder-mystery market is starting to get a bit crowded. First there was C J Sansom's Shardlake, whilst more recently S J Parris has got into the game with Elizabethan spy Giordano Bruno. They have now been joined by John Shakespeare, spy in the pay of Sir Francis Walsingham, Tudor England's equivalent of M. Set in England in the 1580s, England is gripped by fear. The impending execution of Mary, Queen of Scots is expected to draw reprisals from Catholic Europe and King Philip of Spain is amassing a great Armada to launch an invasion of England. Meanwhile, a Catholic assassin is sent to England to kill the great naval commander Sir Francis Drake. John ...  Read the complete review

I seem to be reading a lot of novels these days that set their events in the time of the Tudor monarchs, Henry VIII and Elizabeth. In style this one is similar to the Shardlake stories of CJ Sansom and the Giordano Bruno stories of SJ Parris. Whilst these writers have constructed their heroes entirely fictitiously, Clements has chosen to use the affectation of creating in John Shakespeare a brother for William that in fact he never had! Why it should have been felt necessary I really don't know, other than that it might give the author access to a larger group of potential readers than he might otherwise enjoy! Indeed this, his first novel of the series, ...  Read the complete review

I have just finished reading this book and found it quite hard to get into. It's set in Elizabethan england and the main character is a man called John Shakespeare who is an intelligencer for Walsingham. The story follows his journey of trying to track down 2 jesuit priests- one of whom is suspected as having killed and mutilated a well known lady. Sir Francis Drake plays an important part in the tale as the priests are suspected of trying to kill him to stop him reaching the Spanish coast and stopping the waiting armada from setting sail. Drakes character is a good one- extremely lucky and practically invincible! There is a small love story involved with Shakespeare ...  Read the complete review