Book Review: Interred With Their Bones by Jennifer Lee Carrell

Interred With Their Bones by Jennifer Lee Carrell
Plume
416 Pages
Copyright 2007

Theater director Kate Stanley is on the verge of a career altering coupe – she is set to direct Hamlet on the stage of the Globe Theatre in London, a replica of the very stage where Shakespeare himself once toiled. Then Rosalind Howard, Harvard Shakespearean expert and Kate’s eccentric mentor, arrives to give Kate a mysterious box, stating she’s found something that will prove more interesting and important than staging the play ever could. Kate, to say the least, is doubtful. Then, on June 29, the Globe is once again destroyed by fire and Roz, as Kate knows here, is found dead in the wreckage, poisoned in the same manner of Hamlet’s father.

Her death, along with the mysterious package, leads Kate on a search that takes her from England, to the United States, Spain, and back to England. She is accompanied by Ben Pearl, Roz’s nephew, and chased by the man responsible for Roz’s death, the man who will stop at nothing to keep Kate from solving the mystery, which seems to be wrapped up in the decades old debate as to who really wrote the works attributed to William Shakespeare.

I’ve got a fairly lengthy passage to quote but, for me, it is a perfect example of Carrell’s ability to bring a scene to life. Kate is in Ben’s hotel room, shortly after he has saved her life for the first time. She is, unfortunately, wearing nothing from but a towel, her own clothing too filthy to put back on. Her intent is to ask him for a T-shirt to sleep in:

Sitting where he had a good view – a clear shot? – of both door and windows, he had propped his feet up on the table. His gun lying in easy reach, he was flipping through the pages of Chambers. He’d managed to work the glass out of the book’s front cover, but the dark stain was still there. Above the book, the planes of his face were strongly modeled, as if carved by Michelangelo, or maybe Rodin – though he wore far too many clothes for either.

“Roz told me that Shakespeare’s language is so thick because his stage was so bare,” he said without looking up. “No scenery. Nothing but costumes and a few props.”

I jumped. I hadn’t realized that he’d noticed me. “He built his worlds from words.”

“Did either of you ever read this book?” He turned a page, frowning. “According to old Chambers here, London’s stages could spit out fog and fountains, thunder and lightning, even showers of rain or fireworks – presumably not all at the same time. One playhouse had a movable forest that could rise from trapdoors in the stage floor. Not exactly George Lucas, maybe, but not all that bare-bones either. My favorite is Pluto dressed in burning robes by some frankly sadistic Fates, while – listen to this” – his finger traced a line at the top of a page – “Jupiter descends in majesty beneath a rainbow, his thunderbolt roaring –“

“Did you save my life tonight?”

His finger stopped on the page. “Sounds like Elton John.”

“I’m serious.”

“I try not to be.”

“Well, try. Just this once. For your aunt’s sake, if not for mine.”

Pulling himself away from the book, he leaned back, locking his hands behind his head. His eyes drifted lazily across me, bring to mind a leopard eyeing gazelles from the branches of a comfortable tree. “You ready to throw in the towel?”

Instantly I was aware of every inch of that towel, every curve and terry loop that touched my skin. “Not yet.”

“Then that’s my answer too. Not yet.”

I pulled the towel tighter around me. “Thanks anyway. For saving it so far.”

“Sweet dreams, Professor,” he said with a small smile, turning back to the book.

I love the humor and the heat in that scene and I’ve got to admit, I developed a crush on Ben fairly quickly. The attraction between Kate and Ben carries on through most of the book, without developing into anything graphic, which isn’t necessary.

Recommendation: Carrell weaves factual history in with some liberties of her own to create an amazing, suspenseful story. I’ll admit that some of the Shakespearean intrigue lost me in places but Carrell eventually pulls it all together in a way that makes perfect sense and even taught me a thing or two about it. It’s an all-around wonderful story, well worth the read.