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suzannalundale's review
3.0
Like any anthology, this has things in it that are better than others. Kate Daniel's retelling of Hamlet from Gertrude's point of view was, for me, the highlight. I was sadly disappointed by Charles de Lint's tale, which makes a rather silly narrative leap to bring about resolution, because I like him, and would have thought he'd contribute something better. All in all, worth reading, but do give yourself permission to skip stories that fail to interest you.
asmyr42's review
3.0
Like any anthology, this has things in it that are better than others. Kate Daniel's retelling of Hamlet from Gertrude's point of view was, for me, the highlight. I was sadly disappointed by Charles de Lint's tale, which makes a rather silly narrative leap to bring about resolution, because I like him, and would have thought he'd contribute something better. All in all, worth reading, but do give yourself permission to skip stories that fail to interest you.
calissa's review
4.0
After a very long time sitting on Mt TBR, I have finally got around to reading this book. What a delight it was. I enjoyed all the different kinds of stories. There were stories about Shakespeare himself (meeting gods, witches and travellers from the future), about his plays (mostly being performed for alien races) and different versions of his plays (a vampiric Romeo, King Lear as a computer).
I was a little disappointed to notice a bit of a bias in the stories. There were a few too many versions of King Lear and As You Like It (though I didn't mind As You Like It so much, since it is a favourite of mine). All in all, the structure of the book was excellent. There was just one story I didn't really enjoy and that was The Tragedy of KL--the story about KL as a computer. I was a little rusty on my Lear and all the abbreviations of the names made things difficult. I put down the book a number of times while reading that story. Once past it, however, I hardly put the book down and it was rather made up for by the lovely version of Lear entitled Queen Lyr.
If you like Shakespeare without being a purist and if you like speculative fiction, you should definitely enjoy this book.
I was a little disappointed to notice a bit of a bias in the stories. There were a few too many versions of King Lear and As You Like It (though I didn't mind As You Like It so much, since it is a favourite of mine). All in all, the structure of the book was excellent. There was just one story I didn't really enjoy and that was The Tragedy of KL--the story about KL as a computer. I was a little rusty on my Lear and all the abbreviations of the names made things difficult. I put down the book a number of times while reading that story. Once past it, however, I hardly put the book down and it was rather made up for by the lovely version of Lear entitled Queen Lyr.
If you like Shakespeare without being a purist and if you like speculative fiction, you should definitely enjoy this book.
chronographia's review
3.0
Meh. You are given Shakespeare's whole gamut to mess around with, and this is what you give me? Seriously?
2013 Bookshelf Cull.
2013 Bookshelf Cull.
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