This is a wonderful book and I'm so grateful to the person on DorthyL who recommended it.

Set in a small town in northern New York State, it is 1967 and the local college is getting ready to stage their 100th birthday play, doing the same play that was done for the first year, Hamlet. Nick O'Connor and his wife Lizette audition and become two of the four "professional" actors to be in the play, while all other parts are carried out by both undergraduate and graduate students. Nick is playing Claudius and Lizette is Ophelia. While no one is terribly upset that Nick is there, Lizette getting the plum role of Ophelia is causing some grief among the young females who were all hoping to land that role.

Lizette has a dark secret in her past and is hoping that playing Ophelia will help her get over that past tragedy and Nick is there to make sure everything goes okay. When a stack of Lizette's headshot's are stolen and start showing up with ugly things either attached or written, both Lizette and Nick try to believe that it is one of the jealous aspiring actresses, but is it?

I love Hamlet (well, all of Shakespeare, actually) and having a chance to read several portions with notes on how it is being done, people trying to get the right feelings for their parts, and staging is wonderful.

The mystery is very well done and I only guessed the ending a few pages before it was revealed. There are more in this series so I plan on trying to get others to read, this one was so much fun. ( )