Shakespeare's Trollop (Lily Bard Mysteries, Book 4) [Hardcover]

Charlaine Harris (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 14, 2000

Welcome back to Shakespeare - a charming Arkansas town with endless back roads, an eclectic mix of residents, and a dollop of noir. Featuring cleaning woman/karate expert Lily Bard, Charlaine Harris's series puts a unique spin on the traditional cozy to create mysteries that "work on every level. The writing and plotting are first rate [and] Lily is appealing in her own prickly way" --Washington Times

In the latest installment, Lily discovers lifelong Shakespeare resident Deedra Dean murdered inside a car parked in a woodsy area outside town. Determined not to get involved, Lily wants to leave the police work to Sheriff Marta Schuster and her team of deputies, and concentrate on cleaning, high kicks, and her boyfriend Jack's impending visit. But when Deedra's notoriously promiscuous lifestyle provides an extensive list of suspects but very few clues, Lily has no choice but to resume the roll of amateur detective and join the investigation.

In this fourth book in Charlaine Harris's highly acclaimed and darkly compelling series, Lily Bard delivers a hard-hitting mix of Southern charm and street smarts, a combination so alluring that long-time readers and newcomers will be dying to visit Shakespeare again.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

"There's nothing more revealing about people than the mess they leave for someone else," says Lily Bard, who has the perfect job for an amateur sleuth—she's a cleaning lady in the small, close-knit town of Shakespeare, Ark. A detached and wary observer of others, Lily reluctantly finds herself investigating the murder of one of her employers, Deedra Dean, in her latest engaging outing (after 1998's Shakespeare's Christmas). It's Lily's misfortune to discover Deedra's violated body in her car on a deserted road, the apparent victim of a tryst gone sour. For Lily, who already knows more than she wants about the promiscuous young woman's habits, the details don't add up. Since many of her other clients are related to Deedra, Lily endures their catty, sometimes malicious gossip, but when she helps Deedra's mother clean out the dead woman's apartment, she quietly disposes of Deedra's collection of compromising photos and videos. The nature of the crime forces Lily to deal with her own scars, legacies of the brutal abduction and rape in Memphis that sent her scrambling for the tranquil environs of Shakespeare. A wise, self-counseled soul, as well as a skilled karate student and fitness buff, Lily is just foolhardy enough to charge into a burning house to save a frail, mean old man. Indeed, Lily has such an engaging voice, full of pain and redemption, that the collecting of clues and the unfolding of the crime take a back seat to her personal story. (Aug.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

Lily Bard studies the minutiae of the people whose houses she cleans in Shakespeare, Arkansas. A horrific episode in her own past keeps her wary and private, so she is even more than normally chastened by finding the body of Deedra Dean, naked and violated, in a car in the woods. Deedra was free with herself, and nearly every male in Shakespeare had taken from her, but it's too easy to focus on her taste for male companionship in seeking her murderer, especially when rumors of videotapes and sex toys surface. Lily, meanwhile, is trying to resolve not only Deedra's death but also its resonance in her own psyche and her need, barely acknowledged but deep as water, for Jack, the man in her life. Lily is a terrific character with dark shadings and stark fears, but learning strength and cleaving to it. A supporting cast of quirky characters fully rendered in quick strokes will hold readers as surely as the complex resolution in this cozy on the bleeding edge of noir. GraceAnne A. DeCandido
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: Minotaur Books; 1st edition (August 14, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312262280
• ISBN-13: 978-0312262280
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.4 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (36 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,172,291 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Charlaine Harris (born November 25, 1951 in Tunica, Mississippi) is a New York Times bestselling author who has been writing for over twenty years. She was raised in the Mississippi River Delta area. Though her early works consisted largely of poems about ghosts and, later, teenage angst, she wrote plays when she attended Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee. She began to write books a few years later.
After publishing two stand-alone mysteries, Harris launched a lighthearted series "starring" Georgia librarian Aurora Teagarden, with Real Murders, a Best Novel nominee for the 1990 Agatha Awards. Harris wrote eight Aurora titles. In 1996, she released the first of the much darker Shakespeare mysteries, featuring the amateur sleuth Lily Bard, a karate student who makes her living cleaning houses. Shakespeare's Counselor, the fifth--and last-- was printed in fall 2001.
After Shakespeare, Harris created The Sookie Stackhouse urban fantasy series about a telepathic waitress who works in a bar in the fictional Northern Louisiana town of Bon Temps. The first of these, Dead Until Dark, won the Anthony Award for Best Paperback Mystery in 2001. Each book follows Sookie as she tries to solve mysteries involving vampires, werewolves, and other supernatural creatures. The series, which now numbers nine titles, has been released worldwide.
Sookie Stackhouse proved to be so popular that Alan Ball, creator of Six Feet Under, announced he would undertake the production of a new show for HBO based upon the books. He wrote and directed the pilot episode for that series, True Blood, which premiered in September of 2008. It was an instant success and was quickly picked up for a second season.
In October 2005, Harris's new mystery series about a young woman named Harper Connelly debuted with the release of Grave Sight. Harper has the ability to determine the cause of death of any body. There are now three Harper titles (GRAVE SIGHT, GRAVE SURPRISE, AN ICE COLD GRAVE) with a 4th (GRAVE SECRET) to be released in 2009.
Harris has also co-edited three very popular anthologies with her friend Toni L.P. Kelner. The anthologies feature stories with an element of the supernatural, and the submissions come from a rare mixture of mystery and urban fantasy writers.
Professionally, Harris is a member of the Mystery Writers of America and the American Crime Writers League. She is a member of the board of Sisters in Crime, and alternates with Joan Hess as president of the Arkansas Mystery Writers Alliance. Personally, Harris is married and the mother of three. She lives in a small town in Southern Arkansas and when she is not writing her own books, she reads omnivorously!

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

22 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars An engrosing story, July 19, 2000

By 

Mystery Maven (Tucson, AZ USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Shakespeare's Trollop (Lily Bard Mysteries, Book 4) (Hardcover)

Cleaning lady Lily Bard appears for the 4th time in SHAKESPEARE'S TROLLOP. This time the murder victim is Deedra, the local "bad girl" who was best known for her promiscuity. Nearly every male in town is a suspect, but in spite of having a ton of suspects to question, the police can't figure out the killer's identity.

Deedra's mother, Lacey, asks Lily to help her dispose of Deedra's belongings, and Lily unintentionally learns more about the victim's personal life than she wants to know. Without actually snooping or interrogating suspects, Lily manages to find the vital clue that exposes whodunit. I was kept guessing right to the surprise ending.

Lily is a difficult character. Herself the victim of rape and attempted murder, she has slowly worked out her anger and is just starting to get on with a more normal life. Always an arresting personality, she has become more likeable with each book. In SHAKESPEARE'S TROLLOP, Lily shows her more human side, and I was pleased to see her developing relationship with Jack. I very much look forward to the next in this thought-provoking series.

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Lily Matures!, July 26, 2000

By 

Mandu the Cat (Incline Village, NV USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Shakespeare's Trollop (Lily Bard Mysteries, Book 4) (Hardcover)

Lily Bard, house cleaning extraordinaire, returns to us again with a more mature story then the previous ones in this series. While murder is the topic, the real story here is that Lily advances greatly. I won't blow the maturity issue but I do think this is one of the best books in the series. I am definitely looking forward to the next one to see just how one of my favorite characters continues to grow and become comfortable with her past. I only wish she cleaned in my area!

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Lily Bard, December 19, 2000

By 

Karen Dyer - See all my reviews

This review is from: Shakespeare's Trollop (Lily Bard Mysteries, Book 4) (Hardcover)

In SHAKESPEARE'S TROLLOP, we meet Lily Bard for the fourth time. Lily, housecleaner, karate expert, rape and tortue victim, continues to deal with her past while dealing with the present--people who say, "Oh, you're THAT person". When Lily finds a body, she does what she does with the rest of her life, she quietly goes about her business, keeping her eyes and ears open. In this book, Lily is more personable, more likeable and just as real as ever. I highly recommend this book and sincerely hope that Charlaine Harris can give us another "Lily Bard" as soon as possible!