The Tempestuous Voyage of Hopewell Shakespeare

Hopewell Shakespeare, a young apprentice in London, is bored with his lot and besotted with the Globe, where his distant cousin, William, is already famous. William's plays fuel Hopewell's fantasies of love, glamour and fortune beyond the confines of London; he joins the crew of a notorious buccaneer, Captain Richard Wolfe whose ship the Golden Dragon is embarking on a search for the legendary Lost Island ruled by the Lord of Alchemists. But Hopewell is soon uneasy with the second mate Davy Jones and the waif-like ship's boy Kit Sly, and is beset with strange visions of a beautiful woman and predictions of a White Ship. When the Golden Dragon - ever a pirate ship - pursues and is wrecked by just such a white ship, Hopewell seems to be the sole survivor, and is cast up on an idyllic island inhabited only by an elderly scholar Dr Prosper Bonaventure, a girl, Flora, and her goat, Caprice. This is a place of illusion and transformation, where doors open on to the places of one's innermost dreams. But who from the wreck is truly lost, and who has survived? What is real and what is illusion? Who is evil and who is good? Who is boy and who is girl? And which is the true Lord of Alchemists who manipulates them all? As Hopewell struggles through the twists and turns of the enchanted world, the scales begin to fall from his eyes... Hopewell Shakespeare, a young London apprentice, is bored with his lot and besotted with the Globe, where his cousin William is already famous. Inspired by the plays he sees there, Hopewell sets out on a pirate ship in search of adventure, landing on an island just like the one in "The Tempest". Craving adventure, Hopewell joins the crew of a notorious bucaneer hunting for the legendary Lost Island of the Lord of the Alchemists.