Another brilliant read from Jodi Piccoult. She never fails to please. Set in the time of Shakespeare and present day I couldn’t put this book down. I’m not giving the plot away you’ll just have to read it.

I love Jodi Picoult and have yet to find a book by her I do not devour and this is no exception, in fact this may be one of my favourites. As you would expect from a Jodi Picoult book, this does have multiple POVs but unlike the rest of her books I have read, this isn't multiple POVs of the exact same story. It is two different characters, in two different time periods that are going through similar career issues. Melina is the modern day underappreciated writer with an amazing minority best friend, both trying to make it in New York whereas Emilia is a woman in a time where it was even harder to be a woman.
Although I loved Melina's story, Emilia's is the star of the show for me, it is heart-warming and heart-breaking almost on the same page, even more so as she is actually a historical figure unlike Melina, you really do feel like her cheerleader by the end of the book and although her life does not go how she envisioned or wanted I think it is what she needed and as a reader I think that is even more satisfying.

Now this is Jodi back at her best. I was blown away by this book and could not put it down. We follow the story of a woman who may or may not have been involved in the success of Shakespeare. If this story is true this woman was amazing. As one of her distant relatives discovers her story she finds that although the world has moved on things have not changed much and as she hides her own talent will she ever be able to tell the story of this remarkable woman. Writing at its best and not to be missed!!!

I’m such a fan of Jodi’s work and so I was overjoyed to be allowed to read and review an early copy of her latest book.

What do Emilia Bassano and William Shakespeare have in common? Actually, not too much apart from being alive at the same time, having some mural acquaintances and both being writers- at a time when women weren’t allowed to be published playwrights. So just how did Shakespeare come to know enough about Denmark to write Hamlet, or to describe a fresco in Italy in Othello that he never saw? It’s almost as if he had someone else writing for him….

In the present day, American playwright Melina Green is intrigued to learn of her ancestor from 16th century England, one Emilia Bassano. So when Melina writes a play that suggests Shakespeare’s work was written by others, her life changes - especially when she believes her work as a female writer will not be taken seriously enough so her work is submitted under Mel Green. Not much seems to have changed between Elizabethan England and modern day New York.

This book was an incredible read. Jumping between the two protagonists and their stories being told in their own right, I was hooked from the first page as usual, as Jodi’s writing pulls the reader in deeply to the worlds she creates. I loved it.

Thank you NetGalley for allowing me to read and review.