First published 2016
Felix loses everything when his scheming assistant overthrows him as artistic director of the Makeshiweg Theatre Festival. His cherished production of The Tempest gets scrapped, and Felix retreats to exile in rural Ontario. There he lives alone, haunted by conversations with Miranda, his daughter who died twelve years earlier. Felix eventually finds work at Burgess Correctional Institution, teaching theater to inmates. The prisoners connect deeply with Caliban, seeing themselves in Shakespeare's outcast character. When fate delivers Felix's enemies into his hands, he seizes the chance for revenge. He transforms the inmates' video production of The Tempest into an elaborate trap. His betrayers will become unwitting actors in an interactive performance designed to destroy them. But Felix faces an unexpected complication when his phantom Miranda announces her intention to join the play, forcing him to confront whether his quest for vengeance is worth losing her forever.
Genres: fiction, drama, literary-fiction, contemporary
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: enemies-to-lovers, revenge
Setting: Burgess Correctional Institution, Makeshiweg Theatre Festival, Ontario
Period: 12 years ago
301 pages · Hardcover · Hogarth
Content warnings: death