By Any Other Name
(Sprache: Englisch)
This Shakespearean-era romp follows a stage actor who must team up with an English lord in order to solve the shocking murder of famous playwright Christopher Marlowe, perfect for fans of F.T. Lukens.
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This Shakespearean-era romp follows a stage actor who must team up with an English lord in order to solve the shocking murder of famous playwright Christopher Marlowe, perfect for fans of F.T. Lukens.
Klappentext zu „By Any Other Name “
A down-on-his-luck actor and an English lord reluctantly team up to solve the murder of Christopher Marlowe in this Shakespearean-era young adult romp perfect for fans of F.T. Lukens and Mackenzi Lee.London, 1593. Sixteen-year-old Will Hughes is busy working on Shakespeare's stage, stuffing his corsets with straw and pretending to be someone else. Offstage, he's playing a part, too. The son of traitors, Will is desperate to keep his identity secret-or risk being killed in the bloody queen's imperial schemes. All he wants is to lay low until he earns enough coin to return to his family.
But when his mentor, the famous playwright Christopher Marlowe, is murdered under mysterious circumstances, Will's plans are hopelessly dashed. What's worse, Marlowe was a spy for the queen, tasked with stalking a killer rumored to be part of an elusive order of assassins, and his secrets and untimely death have put Will under a harsh spotlight. And so, when Will unwittingly foils an attempt on the queen's life, she names him her next spymaster.
Now, to avoid uncomfortable questions, prison, or an even more terrible fate, Will reluctantly starts his new career, which-yes-will secure him the resources to help his family...but at what cost? Adding insult to injury is the young Lord James Bloomsbury, Will's new comrade in arms, whose entitled demeanor and unfairly handsome looks get under Will's skin immediately.
Together, the two hunt the cunning assassin, defend the queen's life, and pray to keep their own...all while an unexpected connection blossoms between them.
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Chapter One CHAPTER ONE JUST SOUTH OF the river Thames is a theater called the Rose.
The name is misleading, for a persistent fog of London's foulest stenches perfumes the stage. Should a man find himself there alone, he's like to be relieved of his purse at best or have a knife slipped betwixt his ribs at worst. 'Tis a question of when, and not if, a carelessly lit pipe poofs the building into a pile of ashes. Then the good people of London would cheer to see it dashed from the earth because the Rose Theatre is beyond a doubt one of the most disreputable places in all of Queen Elizabeth's England.
But I love the piss-sodden place because it pays me to do the thing I do best: pretending to be someone I'm not.
The Rose is where I am, on an April afternoon, a crowd thickening before the stage like milk before it spoils. Today we are performing The Tragedy of Dido, Queen of Carthage. We've reached the part where Queen Dido laments the loss of her lover, and it's supposed to be very tragic. Usually I can muster up a few tears from the crowd for this bit. But today the tears shall not come-no, instead the audience is laughing at me.
"I'll frame me wings of wax like Icarus, / And o'er his ships will soar unto the Sun, / That they may melt and I fall in his arms..." My voice cracks, and titters ring out in the first rows of the audience. A drop of sweat-heavy with the white lead paint plastered on my brow-rolls into my eye and stings something fierce.
"Aye, she's got the stones for the part all right!" someone crows.
The laughter swells like an ugly pimple. A sprinkle of roasted hazelnuts bounces off my skirts. I swallow and tug down the bodice of the dress, revealing a tuft of the itchy hay that serves as my tits. A woman in the front row points and whispers to her friend, both laughing.
I turn away from them. Good God, keep it together, man! One wrong step on the rain-slick boards and I'll be on my arse and truly give the crowd something to
... mehr
roar about. As a boy actor, I play all the women's parts in the plays. While the audience doesn't really believe that I am a woman, I must do my best to keep up the charade. Otherwise the crowd turns mean, and Henslowe, the theater manager, threatens to dock my pay.
I stumble through the next lines, my voice cracking on every other word. Zounds, was this dress always so sweltering? I try to furtively wipe away the sweat, but even this elicits another hail of hazelnuts and laughter. The crowd eagerly presses forward in the balconies overhead, faces rapt. Even the rooks nesting upon the thatched roof have stopped screaming, allowing the wide gray sky overhead to swallow my shaking voice. I spot the other players of the Admiral's Men hidden in the theater's wings, here to witness my embarrassing failure-including my delicious Thomas, his perfect face pale as a corpse. Fantastic.
This tragic play has become a comedy, and 'tis all my fault.
After a long, hideous lifetime we reach the play's finale, where I'm supposed to cast myself into a pyre, and then I can stay offstage where no one can laugh at me.
The torch-bearing boys surround me. I sweep across the stage, one hand over my brow, my face drawn into a mask of utter despair. "Live false Aeneas, truest Dido dies..."
I move to throw myself through a secret panel in the stage's center, except, right at the last second, my boots slip on hazelnuts. I cant sideways and crash into one of the torch-wielding boys. He yelps and falls with me, dropping his torch.
Right on the train of my dress.
I stumble through the next lines, my voice cracking on every other word. Zounds, was this dress always so sweltering? I try to furtively wipe away the sweat, but even this elicits another hail of hazelnuts and laughter. The crowd eagerly presses forward in the balconies overhead, faces rapt. Even the rooks nesting upon the thatched roof have stopped screaming, allowing the wide gray sky overhead to swallow my shaking voice. I spot the other players of the Admiral's Men hidden in the theater's wings, here to witness my embarrassing failure-including my delicious Thomas, his perfect face pale as a corpse. Fantastic.
This tragic play has become a comedy, and 'tis all my fault.
After a long, hideous lifetime we reach the play's finale, where I'm supposed to cast myself into a pyre, and then I can stay offstage where no one can laugh at me.
The torch-bearing boys surround me. I sweep across the stage, one hand over my brow, my face drawn into a mask of utter despair. "Live false Aeneas, truest Dido dies..."
I move to throw myself through a secret panel in the stage's center, except, right at the last second, my boots slip on hazelnuts. I cant sideways and crash into one of the torch-wielding boys. He yelps and falls with me, dropping his torch.
Right on the train of my dress.
... weniger
Autoren-Porträt von Erin Cotter
Erin Cotter writes young adult fiction. Originally from Buffalo, New York, she currently calls Austin home. When not writing, she spends time with her partner and pets, eating tacos, and searching for Golden-cheeked Warblers in the Texas Hill Country.
Bibliographische Angaben
- Autor: Erin Cotter
- Altersempfehlung: Ab 14 Jahre
- 2023, 464 Seiten, Maße: 15 x 22,5 cm, Gebunden, Englisch
- Verlag: Simon & Schuster US
- ISBN-10: 1665940719
- ISBN-13: 9781665940719
- Erscheinungsdatum: 09.10.2023
Sprache:
Englisch
Pressezitat
"By Any Other Name is a high-stakes, high-drama mystery set in a vividly rendered Shakespearean London. Erin Cotter takes readers on a journey from the slums to the theaters to the palaces of Elizabethan England, led by a plucky, determined hero I would have followed anywhere. I devoured this romantic, delightful romp!" Mackenzie Lee, New York Times bestselling author of A Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue
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