Author: Pamela Mingle
Series: N/A
Published: 14 August 2012 by Random House
Length: 352 pages
Warnings: suggestive
situations 12+
Source: Netgalley
Summary (abridged): Miranda
has Shakespeare in her blood: However, after her disastrous performance in her
school's staging of The Taming of the Shrew,
Miranda skips the opening-night party. All she wants to do is hide. Fellow cast member, Stephen Langford, has
other plans for Miranda. When he steps out of the backstage shadows and asks if
she'd like to meet Shakespeare, Miranda thinks he's a total nutcase. He wants
Miranda use her acting talents and modern-day charms on the young Will
Shakespeare. Without her help, Stephen claims, the world will lose its greatest
playwright. Miranda isn't convinced
she's the girl for the job. Why would Shakespeare care about her? And just who
is this infuriating time traveler, Stephen Langford? Reluctantly, she agrees to
help, knowing that it's her only chance of getting back to the present and her
"real" life. What Miranda doesn't bargain for is finding true love .
. . with no acting required.
Review: Miranda
has spent her life growing up with Shakespeare. So when Stephen, boy from her
drama group, offers her the chance to travel back in time, meet William
Shakesperae and keep him on a writing path. This leads to her taking on the
disguise of Stephen’s sister, Olivia (but for purposes of continuity, she will
only be known as Miranda throughout this review), dodging religious fanatics of Elizabethan
times, and as the title suggests, kissing Shakespeare
Time travel stories involving real people are always nice to
read. I wasn’t sure if I’d love it, but the premise was interesting to fans of
romance, historical, and Shakespeare alike.
It starts off really quickly, which is nice. We get an
establishing scene of Miranda working playing Kate in her school’s production
of The Taming of the Shrew, but it’s obvious that this isn’t the point.
Miranda’s love for Shakespeare’s plays is revealed as we go further on, saving
boring character building and working it into the plot.
It’s really fun how Miranda and Stephen have to try not to
be discovered having dropped in from modern day America. Miranda’s reactions to
actually being in 1581 are understandable, and even more understandable are
Miranda’s actions when adjusting to life in the 14th century and
when she is told that she’ll be seducing Shakespeare. I wouldn’t want to be
pulled back to a time when women are seen as possessions or suddenly be told to
chat up my idol either.
Miranda develops a bit. She becomes more mature over the
course of Kissing Shakespeare, and a bit
more interesting. The other characters are also good, Stephen and William
especially. The other supporting ones are interesting, but not that great.
The plot is good, without being overshadowed by the romance, even if that was part of the
main plot. Shakespeare being tempted to join the church was a major part. It
wasn’t all that interesting though. This is a rare book where I enjoy the
romance more than anything else.
I found it really cute seeing Miranda and William work
together on The Taming of the Shrew, with him telling her the early version and
she telling him the lines that she’s learnt, hundreds of years later. This then
creates an awkward paradox which, quite simply, makes my head hurt.
There’s one scene in which Miranda goes off with Shakespeare,
being fairly successful in her task of seducing William. And they get kind of
on. and then he calls her Anne. Way to kill the mood. But it also is a nice bit
of character building for him, especially as we know that he ends up marrying
Anne Hathaway. It also furthers their relationship, as just friends. The
romance between Stephen and Miranda is done nicely.
Overall: Strength 3 tea to a book with good potential,
but not amazing results.
Ah. I should read this someday when my reading list is lowered a wee bit. :) Timetravel paradoxes really mess with my mind, so I try to not read too many time-traveling books.
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