Shakespeare's Christmas Gift to Queen Bess

In the winter of 1596, William Shakespeare faces the most consequential night of his career: the performance of 'A Midsummer Night's Dream' before Queen Elizabeth I at court. Yet the playwright carries an unbearable weight. His young son Hamnet has recently died, and Shakespeare must marshal his grief into the service of royal entertainment. Meanwhile, the Mermaid Club gathers for what will be its final meeting, a who's who of Elizabethan playwrights and poets who have defined an era. McMahan weaves a tender portrait of genius in mourning, capturing the strange duality of creation amid loss. The queen receives the play, the lords applaud, but behind the masks and pageantry stands a man wrestling with tragedy while giving England its most enchanting fantasy. This is historical fiction at its most intimate: a glimpse of the artist as both servant and sufferer.