The Shakespeare Requirement: A Novel

I wanted to love this story – it had everything that I thought would make THE story for me – smart characters, academic political wrangling, a marriage in trouble, and the foundations of the protagonist’s thought as an English professor being discounted in the curriculum. And, while I found several moments of laugh out loud (in shock) descriptions of machinations for personal and departmental supremacy that made the current white house seem like a kinder garden sand box, the pieces all didn’t quite fit for me. The writing, and the multiple perspectives were intriguing, but there wasn’t a large distinction in voice between them: language was often pompous and tried too hard to impress with just how smart and above it all they were. At many points I felt as if the words were used as smokescreen, trying to confuse and muddle the view to what real intentions were. And while I enjoyed Jason Finger and his voice, finding him alternately utterly befuddled and completely in charge depending on the situation, his presentation and story had funny moments, it just didn’t show, for me, the growth or progress that I hoped for, even as there were many battlefields on which victories could have been gained. Perhaps small moral ones, or departmental, but I just didn’t have it all feeling coherent once the book had ended. I received an eArc copy of the title from the publisher via Edelweiss for purpose of honest review. I was not compensated for this review: all conclusions are my own responsibility.