In A Daughter of Fair Verona, Christina Dodd presents a great idea that’s completely unmoored by its failure to properly match the time and place in which its characters exist. Deciding that creating an alternative history for a character is fine, if you can at least make me believe we’re in the right time period – even generally. Unfortunately, A Daughter of Fair Verona entirely failed to do that, and left me wondering where – and when – the heck I was supposed to be.

What if Romeo and Juliet had not only lived but managed to produce an entire host of children – the eldest of whom happens to be a happy spinster who hates epic love stories because of her parents’ mega-melodramatic, wildly infamous love story, as fictionalized into a tragedy by Ye Olde Barde himself? That’s the question Dodd poses to us. Her heroine, Rosaline (Rosie) Montague (yes, they named their first child after Romeo’s old crush and Juliet’s cousin) is nineteen and the couple’s eldest daughter. She has a long line of broken betrothals behind her at this point, so when Romeo betroths her to Duke Stephano, it’s an act of desperation. Rosie suspects that the Duke killed at least one of his two previous wives, so she’s less than happy with this situation.

At her betrothal ball, Rosie is introduced to the handsome Prince Escalus – and loses another fiancé when Stephano is found dead with a dagger in him. Who killed the Duke? Rosie sets about finding out while being mightily intrigued by Escalus.

Look, I know it’s hard walk in Shakespeare’s shadow, and how impenetrable to the virgin eye Ye Olde English can be; but Dodd’s solution to this is to volley back and forth between using Ye Shekspar’s Olde English and an extremely modern narrative voice for Rosie. This proves beyond distracting. I have no problem with Romeo and Juliet surviving to become adults with a passionate marriage whose children are a little embarrassed by them. It’s a great, cute concept. So what on earth happened here?

The way-too-modern language is not the only disappointment here; while little Rosie sounds like a mall rat, not an Italian woman from a vaguely Elizabethan era, other authors have made such wallpaperish prose work. She’s also perhaps too independent, but hey, the Médicis were already a thing at this point. But the uneven characterization is also a tough sell – one moment she’s smart, strong and determined never to marry because the family needs her sensibility to keep running the household; the next she’s just helpless enough to allow the prince’s interfearence. In short, it ought not to sound like As You Texted It.

I liked Rosie as a person. I liked Prince Escalus, until the last quarter of the book set out to ruin their relationship. I know Dodd is trying to set up a series, but this is both incomplete and changes everything we think we know about the prince, making us wonder if he really DOES love Rosie. I liked Rosie’s siblings, and Romeo and Juliet, who feel as if they’ve grown up just enough but are still those impulsive teenagers. The mystery is also wonderfully absorbing.

Look, Candle in the Window is one of my favorite historical romances of all time. I have no idea what the heck happened here, but even other books cut from the same mold – the Enola Holmes of the world – at least make me feel like the author is doing proper tribute to the source material. A Daughter of Fair Verona fails this test, yet I liked Rosie enough to want to read more about her.