A Daughter of Fair Verona (Daughter of Montague)
Rosie is the first-born child of Romeo and Juliet, delivered nine months after Juliet failed to stab herself to death (stabbing a gold pendant instead and fainting in the process) and Romeo awoke and purged himself of an unreliable dose of poison. Rosie has just been betrothed to the thrice-widowered Duke Leir Stephano (all wives poisoned to death, the most recent by eels that went bad?). At the betrothal ball, Stephano is found dead, a knife to his heart, and Rosie is the presumed killer.
A Daughter of Fair Verona is the first in a new series by the bestselling author of suspense and romance. The book is saucy with witty twists on Shakespearean characters and stories: The Toil and Trouble apothecary carries a cauldron on the carved sign above its door. A suitor calls out to fair maiden Rosie, this time on a tree branch at her balcony. And like any good Shakespearean plotline, the bodies pile up.
The feisty, fetching lead character rushes into threatening situations, refuses to hold her tongue, and is unafraid to carry hidden knives and brandish them when necessary. As a mystery, however, the narrative moves along haphazardly, introducing suspects and incriminating situations without building a case against any. So, the reader isn’t pulled along into the solving but pushed into a surprising end. That doesn’t mean readers won’t want to catch Rosie next time around and go once more into the breach.
