Sophia Rose Reviews: Shakespeare’s Champion by Charlaine Harris, narrated by Julia Gibson

 

Shakespeare’s Champion by Charlaine Harris, narrated by Julia Gibson

#2 Lily Bard

Mystery

Publisher:  Recorded Books

Published:  9.24.09

Time:  7 hours 20 minutes

Rating: 4.5 stars

Format: audio

Source:  library

Sellers:  Amazon

ADD TO: GoodReads

GoodReads Synopsis:

When Lily stumbles upon the well-built corpse of a local body builder - his neck broken by a barbell - the town's underlying racial tension begins to boil over. The white victim was somehow connected to two unsolved murders of black residents of Shakespeare - and a dogged policeman is determined to stop the killing. But it is Lily herself who may have to decide whether to stay and fight for justice, or run away one more time.

 

Sophia Rose's Review:

After a few weeks of adjusting to being more a part of her Shakespeare community, keeping busy with her cleaning and errand business, and dipping her pinky toe into the waters of romance, abuse and kidnapping survivor, Lily Bard, stumbles upon another body.  Charlaine Harris’ first Lily Bard mystery had me swiftly progressing to the second installment in the series which has plenty of ongoing connections making it best read in order.

 

Shakespeare’s Champion opens with Lily and Bobo Winthrop, a young fitness buff and new employee at Marshall Sedaka’s gym coming across a body builder who was working out in prep for a chance at the championship.  Lily might have left this murder up to the cops, but something insidious is happening around the town and she’s been unsettled since the brutal beating to death of a young black man and follow-up death of a local white farmer.  Both deaths remain unsolved and now this one.  Then there are the mutterings, flyers, and hostilities happening from some whites toward the black community.  What is happening to her adopted small town?

 

Shakespeare’s Champion raises the issues of race, gender, and, of course, abuse of justice along with Lily’s private struggle recovering from kidnapping, rape and abuse that drove her to live off on her own in Shakespeare.  I appreciated how Charlaine Harris addressed those concerns while putting forward a darker, suspenseful mystery for Lily who, again, due to her work cleaning and working behind the scenes in several homes and businesses around town, gets the inside scoop on people.

 

In the previous book, Shakespeare’s Landlord, Lily started something up with gym owner and karate instructor, Marshall Sedaka, and there were hints of an attraction with police chief, Claude Friedrich, but I appreciated how this installment brings closure to both of those while leaving her more healed from her past ordeal- not even completely over that kidnapping and rape, but able to engage more with other people- and introduces a new possibility with the new mysterious guy in town who she bumps into at the gym, at the Wynthrop home, and working at the Wynthrop’s outdoor store.  His presence has her curious and the zing she gets when they meet eyes is nothing to the stunning twists he adds to that darker mystery she is working on in Shakespeare. 

 

Julia Gibson continues to narrate the series and I really like what she brings to the story.  Lily is a complicated character and there is a large and varied cast that she handles well.

 

Lily is forced to experience some big suspenseful moments that leave her beaten down and having to show her grit to keep going.  There were things I saw coming as the mystery unwound, but a couple surprises were also in store.  Again, I’m left eager to rush toward the next installment to see what murder mystery Lily is faced with next.

 

Character Bio:

Charlaine Harris has been a published writer for over forty years. Her first two books were standalones, followed by a long sabbatical when she was having children. Then she began the Aurora Teagarden book, mysteries featuring a short librarian (eventually adapted for Hallmark movies). The darker Lily Bard books came next, about a house cleaner with a dark past and considerable fighting skills.

Tired of abiding by the mystery rules, Harris wrote a novel about a telepathic barmaid that took at least two years to sell. When the book was published, it turned into a best seller, and DEAD UNTIL DARK and the subsequent Sookie books were adapted in Alan Ball's "True Blood" series. At the same time, Harris began the Harper Connelly books. Harper can find the bones of the dead and see their last minute.

When those two series wound to a close, the next three books were about a mysterious town in Texas, called Midnight.

A change in publisher and editor led to Harris's novels about a female gunslinger in an alternate America, Lizbeth Rose. The Gunnie Rose books concluded with the sixth novel.

She's thinking about what to write next.

Sophia’s Bio:

Sophia is a quiet though curious gal who dabbles in cooking, book reviewing, piano-playing, and gardening. Road trips and campouts, museums and monuments, restaurants and theaters are her jam. Encouraged and supported by an incredible man and loving family. A Northern Californian transplant to the Great Lakes Region of the US. Lover of Jane Austen, Baseball, Cats, Scooby Doo, and Chocolate.

As a lifelong reader, it was inevitable that Sophia would discover book blogs and the joy of blog reviewing. Sophia is a prolific reader and audiobook listener which allows her to experience so many wonderful books, authors, and narrators. Few genres are outside her reading tastes, but her true love is fiction particularly history, mystery, sci-fi, and romance. Though, sorry, no horror or she will run like Shaggy and Scooby.

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