After the death of his wife, Peter Byerly, a young antiquarian bookseller, relocates from the States to the English countryside, where he hopes to rediscover the joys of life through his passion for collecting and restoring rare books. But when he opens an eighteenth-century study on Shakespeare forgeries, he is shocked to see a Victorian portrait strikingly similar to his wife tumble out of its pages, and becomes obsessed with tracking down its origins. As he follows the trail back to the nineteenth century and then to Shakespeare"s time, Peter learns the truth about his own past and unearths a book that might prove that Shakespeare was indeed the author of all his plays. Guaranteed to capture the hearts of everyone who truly loves books and literature - in particular the golden age of Shakespeare, Jonson and Marlowe - THE BOOKMAN"S TALE is a sparkling novel and an engrossing exploration of one of literature"s most tantalizing mysteries.