Mask of Night

'Highly entertaining' Sunday TimesHistory meets mystery with a new twist in this raucous, colourful novel set in the bustling theatrical world of Shakespeare and Marlowe during the reign of the formidable Elizabeth I.Elizabeth I approaches the end of her illustrious reign, the plague is raging in London, and the Privy Council has ordered the theaters closed. Actor-sleuth Nick Revill and the Chamberlain's Men travel to Oxford, where a local physician, Dr. Hugh Fern, has commissioned a private performance of Romeo and Juliet.While Fern's motive is obscure - an attempt to reconcile two feuding families to the prospect of a marriage, perhaps; or maybe simply a ploy to get himself a role in the production- his fate is not. Indeed, he is decidedly dead, when his body is discovered during a performance at the Golden Cross Inn. Though the deceased lies inside a locked room, and the pestilence has followed the Chamberlain troupe from London, Revill is convinced Fern has not succumbed to natural causes.Nor is Fern's death the only one that rouses Revill's suspicions. The mysteries multiply as a strange band of men in cowls patrols the town at night, a simple carter meets a baffling end, and a corpse changes its shoes.