A retelling of Shakespeare’s Macbeth from the point of view of the unnamed Lady Macbeth? Yes, please.

After having her books on my wishlist for years, 2025 is the year I’m reading Ava Reid and I’m so delighted about that. Reid is a queen and after reading A Study in Drowning and Lady Macbeth I’m now a full-time member of her fan club.

Where A study in Drowning had a sense of tenderness, Lady Macbeth is a lot rougher, while the prose is still exquisite *and* adapted to the story. To be fair, I was convinced this book would be great after reading the character list which ended on a note about there being different versions of a name because of linguistic differences between regions at the time. Yes, queen.

I’d read Macbeth before reading this book, but I’d say it’s not a necessary step. The details were hazy at best anyway in my memory, so if you read both, that’s great, but Lady Macbeth very much stands on its own. There was a creative use of some of the play’s elements, and while the final twist fell a tiny bit flat for me, I still enjoyed the rest so much that I won’t hold it against the author (that, or putting glass windows in an 11th-century Scottish castle).

Time will tell how much of an impact this book had on me, but in the meantime I had an excellent reading experience and this book grabbed my attention enough to read it during quiet times at work in a busy environment, which is saying a lot!