Title: Miranda and Caliban

Author: Jacqueline Carey

Series: N/A

Genre: Fantasy

Release Date: February 14, 2017

The Overview: In William Shakespeare’s The Tempest, the action of the entire play unfolds over the course of a single day. But what happened on the island in the twelve years leading up to that day? Why does the magician Prospero keep his daughter Miranda ignorant of her history? Why does he take the supposedly monstrous Caliban under his wing?

Miranda is a lonely child. For as long as she can remember, she and her father have lived in isolation in the abandoned Moorish palace. There are chickens and goats, and a terrible wailing spirit trapped in a pine tree, but the elusive wild boy who spies on her from the crumbling walls and leaves gifts on their doorstep is the isle’s only other human inhabitant. There are other memories, too: vague, dream-like memories of another time and another place. There are questions that Miranda dare not ask her stern and controlling father, who guards his secrets with zealous care: Who am I? Where did I come from? The wild boy Caliban is a lonely child, too; an orphan left to fend for himself at an early age, all language lost to him. When Caliban is summoned and bound into captivity by Miranda’s father as part of a grand experiment, he rages against his confinement; and yet he hungers for kindness and love. This darkly re-imagined vision of Shakespeare’s beloved tale is told in their voices and is rife with issues of power and control, innocence and sexuality. Lovers of the fantastic, the classic, and beautiful writing will fall in love with Carey’s imaginative retelling. -Goodreads

Nik’s Notes:

Jacqueline Carey dazzled me with her Kushiel’s Legacy and gave me all the feels with Imriel’s Trilogy (I’m still saving Morin’s Trilogy for a rainy day). Now she has a prequel retelling of Shakespeare’s The Tempest on the way and, regardless of my initial hesitance at anything Shakespeare-related, I can guarantee Miranda and Caliban is going to be a beautiful piece of work. I may not read it immediately, but I’m thrilled Carey is still writing and always look forward to anything she produces.

What book are you looking forward to?

By Niki Hawkes