THE QUEENS OF INNIS LEAR

released OUT NOW! 576 pages | Hardback/ ebook/audiobook

Author Tessa Gratton Publisher HarperVoyager King Lear’s noted for being one of William Shakespeare’s gloomiest tragedies. This fantasy novel reworks the story, looking at the women around Lear, his wife and his daughters, and how his tragedy is also their tragedy. In many cases the names are only slightly changed, and if you know the original you’ll have an idea of where the narrative is heading.

The characters perform, in the main, the same roles as in the play. Gaela and Regan, the story’s equivalents of Goneril and Regan, are strangely less real than in Shakespeare, their motives explored more but somehow harder to empathise with; Elia and Ban, the Cordelia and Edmund characters, are deeper, more sympathetic. You’ll find yourself feeling for Ban, in particular.

However, the book is also more than just a simple retelling. Tessa Gratton looks beyond the characters and creates a beautiful world, one where there’s magic in the trees and water, and prophecies come from the stars. This gives the story freshness, providing motives for the characters as they struggle with their fates. Overall it’s reminiscent of one of Angela Carter’s reworkings of classic fairytales. And, like Carter, Gratton returns to the folklore behind the well-known version of the Lear story at the end – which may surprise you.