I know of Ms. Forbes from her nonfiction writing, which I enjoyed very much. When I saw the blurb for her first fiction book, I was intrigued.
Everyone who has ever acted onstage or worked behind the scenes of a play knows that Shakespeare’s shortest, bloodiest play, MacBeth, is cursed. Actors and audience members have died during performances, storms have destroyed theaters where it was playing, and even quoting famous lines from the play can bring about show-stopping disaster.
So when the tackiest, most tasteless dinner theater in the Midwest launches its own musical version of MacBeth, complete with dancing witches, an unruly dog, a Wiccan assistant stage manager and the Curse, things are bound to get interesting.
Mint Juleps, Mud Pie and MacBeth is – and this is going to sound awful – just ok. The basics of the plot are fine, and it’s a very intriguing idea . . . but it doesn’t quite ‘gel’ for this reader. I think Ms. Forbes has a lot of talent in writing, but she would have benefited from an editor in this case. The bones are good, but it all got lost and muddied, something an editor (or good, critical reader) would have helped with.
I really wanted to like Mint Juleps, Mud Pie and MacBeth.
~review by Luisa Martinez
Author: Bronwen Forbes
Graveyard Publishing, 2009
pp. 216;$16.95
