BRAVO, MR. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE!

Will’s twins, Hamnet and Judith, might themselves have been entranced by this clever telling of seven of their dad’s plays. Williams has a brilliant signature style: in bright watercolor and ink images replete with fulsome and waggish detail, she builds a page of panels surrounded by a border. In the panels, the text is taken from Shakespeare’s own words; below the panels, her narrative continues the action. The borders, inspired by illuminated manuscript drolleries, are full of comments from the audience, rife with puns (“It’s what you Will!”) and sly remarks (“a plague on all this kissing!”). She handles As You Like It, Antony and Cleopatra, Richard II, Twelfth Night, King Lear, The Merchant of Venice, and Much Ado About Nothing fearlessly, using a grisaille, Gorey-esque palette for the tragedies and full-out color saturation for the comedies, all with a kind of nervous, effervescent line that suits both initial and repeated examination. All the adoring fans of Williams’s Tales from Shakespeare will rejoice, and new ones will join in the applause. (Picture book. 8-12)