J.S. Borthwick, Foiled Again

Foiled Again

J.S. Borthwick

St. Martin's, Mar 2007, $24.95

ISBN 0312366558

At Maine's Bowmouth College, the Drama School Chair Vera Pruczak is producing a gender-bending version of Romeo and Juliet, Romiette and Julio. Vera enjoys sticking it to the prim and proper English Department Chair Danton McGraw, which this production does as he holds Shakespeare sacred. However, this time Vera also annoys the local residents who feel she is going too far with poetic license.

As Vera and Danton argue, English Professor Sarah Deane tries to bring a truce between her friend and her boss. During rehearsal, talented Todd Mancuso is beaten up and his replacement as Mercutio Draco Malfoy, is almost killed. However, the show proves a success in Sarah's mind because no one else was hurt though anger simmered near the surface. Sarah soon knows her assessment was wrong when the curtain closes because Grover Blaine is dead backstage. Ignoring Maine State Police Sergeant George Fitts' plea to stay out of the investigation, as she has done with other homicides, Sarah investigates the murder investigation.

Once again, Sarah proves the world's a stage where a murder investigation becomes the prime show. The storyline provides readers with a glimpse at the rivalries, often acrimonious, amidst the "gentle" academia. As the Bowmouth drama school prepares for its next production, perhaps of Hamletta, Princess of Denmark, FOILED AGAIN is, as the opening quote from Shakespeare says, "a hit, a very palpable hit."

Harriet Klausner