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Enter the Body

Audiobook
1 of 1 copy available
1 of 1 copy available
“At once tender, poetic and ferocious, Enter The Body breathes new life into the Bard’s most tragic heroines. More than a tribute to Shakespeare, this kaleidoscopic, ambitious novel-in-verse gives Juliet, Ophelia, Cordelia, and Lavinia the chance to tell their own stories full of passion, justice, sisterhood, and love. Simply spectacular.”—Michael L. Printz Award winner Laura Ruby, author of Bone Gap
In the room beneath a stage's trapdoor, Shakespeare’s dead teenage girls compare their experiences and retell the stories of their lives, their loves, and their fates in their own words. Bestselling author Joy McCullough offers a brilliant testament to how young women can support each other and reclaim their stories in the aftermath of trauma.
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    • Publisher's Weekly

      January 16, 2023
      Focusing primarily on Cordelia, Juliet, and Ophelia, McCullough (Great or Nothing) excavates the inner lives of William Shakespeare’s most famous tragic heroines in this absorbing experimental novel in verse. Beneath the trap door of a theater, the characters—portrayed as ghosts—share their secrets and traumas with one another while waiting to be resurrected to embody their assigned roles and die on stage each night. The author addresses the absent mothers and lack of education the women faced throughout their lives, as well as their roles as scapegoats for the poor behavior of their stories’ male leads, through assorted methods. Wrenching poetic monologues (“Mother found/ less love than I/ in the House of Capulet”), script pages of illuminating dialogue (“I have a question?” Juliet asks Cordelia, who responds, “Oh. We’re talking now?”), and prose that briefly foregrounds a larger contemporary world beyond the trap door (“the audience stretches, unwraps candy, checks their phones”) provide searing, if occasionally pedantic, commentary on the women’s portrayal as docile figures. Via varied signature poetic styles and cadences, such as Cordelia’s traditional iambic pentameter and Juliet’s short staccato bursts, the women question their desires and sexual identities, and together process their individual traumas. Ages 14–up. Agent: Jim McCarthy, Dystel, Goderich & Bourret.

    • School Library Journal

      Starred review from April 1, 2023

      Gr 9 Up-"I love Shakespeare," McCullough points out in her author's note, but "he was far from infallible. There is much to criticize in his plays." Reminiscent of Caryl Churchill's iconic drama, Top Girls, McCullough spotlights four of the Bard's best-known dead teen girls-Juliet (13), Ophelia (15), Cordelia (17), and Lavinia (19), who was mutilated into eternal silence and still can't speak here, but McCullough ensures she's heard. The setting is "the trap room beneath all the stages, anywhere." McCullough herself directs, enabling her characters, explicating scenes for her audiences. Lohman is an emotional, energetic Juliet, a pawn in an unforgiving family feud; Villarreal a soft, lyrical Ophelia misled by fickle Hamlet; Annie Q a wise-beyond-her-years Cordelia fatally betrayed by her own father and sisters. VERDICT An undeniably powerful quartet delivers a reclamatory, empowering performance.

      Copyright 2023 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

    • AudioFile Magazine
      An ensemble cast brings four of Shakespeare's female victims of violence to life in this devilishly intelligent audiobook. Author Joy McCullough delivers the narrative, with Valerie Rose Lohman's Juliet, Victoria Villarreal's Ophelia, and Annie Q's Cordelia soliloquizing, in turn. When the young women start talking to one another, the story becomes one of healing and revision. Their voices are as distinct as their personalities; Juliet's youthful reediness, Ophelia's dreamy softness, and Cordelia's stiff wariness uphold each character's integrity even as she expands beyond the bounds of Shakespeare's imagination. TITUS ANDRONICUS's Lavinia, who is horribly mutilated, cannot speak, but in McCullough's emotionally restrained narration is a haunting testament to the power of healing--and its limits. Cue a standing ovation. V.S. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2023, Portland, Maine

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