Much Ado About Love (Avon Romance) [Mass Market Paperback]

Here is the low-down on the story:
After something in Shakespeare's latest play upsets the Queen, her best agent, Sir Ian Terrance, is sent to take the playwrite to the Tower. When, upon apprehending the man, Sir Ian discovers that not only is HE a SHE, but also the bastard daughter of the Queen, all hell breaks loose in Sir Ian's well ordered existance. Now Sir Ian is in a quandry for, as a young man of 19, he had been sent to do away with Olivia Tudor because she posed a threat to the Virgin Queen's throne, but he had allowed the 10-year-old Olivia to escape. Fearing retribution from his monarch for failing to do his job so long ago, Sir Ian must find a way to hide Olivia until he can decide what to do. However, Olivia has other ideas. She has speant her life knowing that she was a threat to the Queen, the mother she had never met, and had known that the day would come when she would be found and executed. Now that she was in the hands of the Queen's agent, she just wanted her first meeting with her mother and subsequent death to happen quickly. Thus begins a battle of wills, and words!

What made this book such a delight was the brilliant dialog. Ms. Martin really captured some of the wit of Shakespeare and it was so much fun to follow along! Add to that the little, and sometimes not so little, parallels between the plays of the bard and the plot of the book and you have a book that is not only fun to read but romantic as well!

He makes Olivia his prisoner, but Ian soon falls in love with her. As Ian struggles to tame the shrew, Olivia, feeling like an idiot filled with sound and fury, returns his love. However, someone else seems to know that Olivia is William and has Lady MacBeth plans to disrupt the court even if they kill Olivia in the process. With growing court intrigue and a deep love, the witches would foretell that this relationship would prove that all's well do not end well for everyone especially these two lovers.

This Elizabethan romantic romp places a gender twist on "Shakespeare in Love." The story line is fun and often amusing as the lead couple dual with lips (words and kisses) even as danger threatens to engulf them. Perhaps intrepid author Malia Martin should have chosen Marlowe in love so as to avoid comparison to the works of the greatest writer of all times and the recent award winning movie. Still, though requiring leaps of faith that a daughter of Elizabeth is the Bard, Ms. Martin provides a refreshing look at Elizabethan romance that will elate sub-genre readers.

Harriet Klausner