From the blurb:

A deadly serial killer is on the loose, modelling his sickening murders on Shakespeare’s plays. But why is he killing? And how can he be stopped?

Hmm… another book I’m left with mixed feelings about. On one hand, the description, particularly during the opening couple of chapters, felt laboured while striving for grandios and did nothing except annoy me. I also spotted the culprit from pretty much the beginning, having noted the parallel with The Da Vinci Code.

All of my first impressions of the characters turned out to be largely correct. Kate’s reason for not going to the police was flimsy at best and got thinner as the book went on. I also found the plot a touch confusing in places.

Still, I enjoyed the Shakespeare references and thought it was a great way to be introduced to Shakespearian scholarship and more particularly to the question of Shakespeare’s true identity (though despite that, I saw no real trace of the startling true revelations from the life of Shakespeare promised later in the blurb). The description settled down once the action really got started and it was generally fairly well paced.

On the whole, however, I was left rather disappointed.