'Hamnet' by Maggie O'Farrell is currently in the best seller list and for once I can agree with all the praise and attention that this book is receiving. I have not enjoyed a new book to this extent for a long time. Although the title is the name of Shakespeare's son, the story really belongs to Shakespeare's wife. She is wonderfully created, with qualities taken from various characters in Shakespeare's plays; wise, creative, rather magical and also, in part of the book, absolutely grief stricken. This book had me thoroughly involved - and from time to time in tears.
The author clearly wanted to give Shakespeare a fitting partner and there are so few known facts about their life that she was able to use great imaginative freedom. We know that his wife was older than Shakespeare and already pregnant at the time of their marriage. The only other known fact is that in his will Shakespeare left all his considerable possessions to his elder daughter but only his second best bed to his wife!
As soon as I'd finished the story I looked in my bookcase for a bit of historical information and found the historian Ian Wilson's book, 'Shakespeare the Evidence". It is full of interesting detail. It contains a copy of Shakespeare's will. I'm afraid I'm not as optimistic about the quality of his marriage as is Maggie O'Farrell!
This month the Yorkshire book group had a zoom meeting to discuss a novel set in Yorkshire by a well-known Yorkshire writer, Kate Atkinson. The book, 'Big Sky' is one in a series featuring the detective Jackson Brodie. It met with a mixed response and a lively discussion - one of the members said that he threw his copy of the book across the room, but most of us enjoyed it, especially because we know the various places featured. The book is written as an entertainment, with a large cast and many sub plots, too many was the general opinion. The 'hero', Jackson Brodie, has interior dialogues with his ex-partner who invariably ends his thoughts with a put-down. Other characters have interior monologues, but I thought they were all a rather similar voice. I liked the depiction of the two teenage boys in the novel, they made me smile.
There was an interesting division within the group between the males and the females. The main subject matter of the story is about a paedophile and trafficking ring and the men in the book group were uneasy with the contrast between the jokey style of the writing and the serious subject, they felt that the two didn't sit together well. The females in the group were not concerned by this, it was an interesting division that we thought we would discuss when we are able to meet once more in person.
