#20BooksOfSummer # 5 - Shakespeare's Trollop

The most difficult part of my 20 Books of Summer is that each book is from a series -- and none of them the first OF the series. I always find that difficult to review properly because I don't want to give too much of the previous installments away in case you haven't read them yet. It's like being told how a tv series has ended before ever watching it yourself. When you finally do get to watch it you're all "Oh ... yeah ... I know this. ____ told me all about it. I hate them. Why should I even bother?" And, you know, I don't want you to hate me SO I'll just ramble a bit about the series in vague generalities and the book in even more vagueness.

Shakespeare's Trollop is the fourth of five Lily Bard mysteries by Charlaine Harris (better known to some as the creator of Sookie Stackhouse of HBO's True Blood). I had read the first three back-to-back pre-blog so can't say "go back here [insert link] to catch up." Sorry.

Lily Bard, the heroine (though don't tell her I called her that -- she would disagree at the label), is nothing like Sookie. Shakespeare is nothing like Bon Temps. There are no vampires or faeries or were-whatevers ... but there are monsters. These monsters, though, are just humans who torture, lie, steal, kill, etc. Lily works as a cleaning lady in Shakespeare, Arkansas, where she settled some years back after being victimized by monsters of her own. It's taken her some time to feel like it's "home" rather than just some place to live, but she's finally getting there. It's a small town which, of course, means that pretty much everyone knows (or is related to) everyone. Unfortunately, in a mystery series this also means that someone that you've come to know in previous books may be getting killed off.

I won't tell you who, of course. Spoilers and all.

What I will say is that I didn't realize just how much I missed Lily and Shakespeare since I left them at Christmastime and after I read the next (and last) book in the series, Shakespeare's Counselor, I may very well go into a period of mourning over the loss.