Buy on Amazon: O, Juliet by Robin Maxwell
Shakespeare has never been my “thing”. Of course, I know the story of Romeo and Juliet, star-crossed lovers, a family fued, the romantic deaths of these two young people. But since I could never be bothered to actually read Shakespeare my knowledge of the story came from seeing the ballet (which horrified me as a pre-teen since I didn’t know the ending) and watching movies based on it.
Robin Maxwell did a fantastic job with making this story easy to read, easy to relate to and beautiful. The Dante quotations were thrilling and evoked a feeling of hopelessness in me and I found myself completely caught up in first, the hope of reconciliation (such a futile hope though) and finally heart-broken at the means in which everything fell to pieces around Romeo and Juliet.
A passionate, heart-breaking, full-blown romance story. This is the stuff that makes historical fiction so much fun to read.
I loved this one too even though I hated the play. Great review!