Price: $14.00
Binding: Trade paperback
Trim size: 5" x 7-1/2"
Pages: 240
ISBN: 1-932325-03-4

This 2004 Mystery Company edition restores to print the 1999 novel that marked the debut of Alan Gordon and his Fools' Guild series.

"Continuing a story first told by Shakespeare is a challenge that would freeze the ink in most writers' quill pens, but Alan Gordon attempts the task with commendable courage and accomplishes it with dismaying ease. Drawing on the same sources as Shakespeare used to create Twelfth Night, a comedy of misunderstandings, misdirection, and cross-dressing, Gordon takes us back to Illyria fifteen years later and gives us Thirteenth Night, a mystery of misperceptions, misdirection, and double crosses. It is a thoroughly enjoyable tale told by a born storyteller, full of sound and fury and a fair amount of juggling."

Praise for Alan Gordon and Thirteenth Night

"Here's a fresh idea: Feste, a minor character in Shakespeare's Twelfth Night, is actually a top operative of the Fools' Guild, an organization of professional jesters who double as secret agents. The Duke of Orsino, Twelfth Night's central character, has died under mysterious circumstances, and Feste suspects foul play from the evil Malvolio, whose self-serving plot was foiled in Shakespeare's drama. Feste returns to Orsino, posing as a German merchant, determined to discover which member of the citizenry is a killer in disguise. This exceedingly clever novel is a treat for all mystery fans (especially those familiar with Shakespeare's play); it is delightfully constructed, featuring an intricate whodunnit with political overtones, plenty of intrigue, and a healthy dose of humor. With an idea this original, Gordon, a New York legal-aid lawyer, could have skated through the novel, relying on the court-jesters-as-secret-agents premise to keep readers going. But he didn't; on every level -- characters, plot, and style, in addition to premise -- this is an outstanding first mystery and, one hopes, the beginning of a fine series."

Booklist (starred review)

"In an awesome series, scholar and sorcerer Alan Gordon offers humor, thrills and delight. He weaves his scintillating mysteries within the plays of Shakespeare, whose clowns become a secret Guild of Fools, sent into the world as benign conspirators to fight evil and protect the good. His ingenuity in expanding the boundaries of the historical mystery genre and his gently erudite style of linking literature and history are matchless."

The Drood Review

"A spellbinding medieval mystery, Thirteenth Night hurls one into a world that is brilliantly depicted. The plotting is excellent and the story moves at an exciting pace through a skillfully portrayed series of characters to the thrilling denouement."

Peter Tremayne

"An amusing sequel to Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night that, through clever misdirection and deceit, keeps readers guessing. Gordon’s inventon of the Guild’s code and its many tricks is delightful: his dialogue is pitch perfect."

Publishers Weekly

"Witty wordplay, comical characters, and exaggerated circumstances mark this fanciful and entertaining historical."

Library Journal

Alan Gordon is the author of five Fools’ Guild mysteries. His short fiction and essays have appeared in Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine, The Drood Review of Mystery and the Medieval Academy Newsletter. He lives in New York City with his wife, Judy Downer, and son, Robert. By day, he is a lawyer with the Legal Aid Society.

Fools’ Guild Mysteries by Alan Gordon:

Thirteenth Night (1999)
Jester Leaps In (2000)
A Death in the Venetian Quarter (2002)
The Widow of Jerusalem (2003)
An Antic Disposition (2004)