Rose Rushe wants to be a court musician more than anything else in the world. With Queen Elizabeth I newly ascendant on the throne, her goal feels within reach if she can only get an audition. But the universe (and Rose’s mother) have different plans for her. After the death of her father, Rose, her mother and her friend Cecely are all accused of witchcraft and forced to flee to London. Rose finds refuge in the home of Richard Underhill, the son of one of her late father’s friends. Security for her family is within reach as long as Rose plays the meek woman and secures a place within Underhill’s household as his wife. But the prospect of such a life is anathema to Rose. As she struggles to avoid the web of her mother’s well-intentioned meddling, an escape path lined with brothels, astrology and a young writer named William Shakespeare presents itself—if only Rose is brave and foolhardy enough to take the first step.
In A Rose by Any Other Name, author Mary McMyne explores a question that scholars and English teachers have debated for centuries: Who was the “Dark Lady” depicted in some of Shakespeare’s most iconic sonnets? McMyne gives this mystery woman shape, autonomy and desire in the figure of Rose, whom she guides through a dark Elizabethan England full of traps for women—especially queer women like Rose—who crave independence from the men who hold their leashes. While Rose’s struggle for freedom may include some familiar tropes and character types, the original world that McMyne has created shines. Her descriptions of magic are rich with heavy, cloying scents and skin-tingling sensations. Her streets feel full of possibility and danger. And Rose and her imperfect, wild compatriots seem to spring from the page. A captivating blend of forensic literary analysis and dark magic, A Rose by Any Other Name is a fascinating exploration into the world of “what if.”
