It has been three years since Shakespeare’s death, and his closest friends miss him dearly. They have only some of his masterful plays in their possession, and, after hearing a badly-botched version of Hamlet at a nearby theatre, they realize that Shakespeare’s words are starting to fade into obscurity. They decide all of his original plays need to be found or recreated and published into a book, a definitive collection of his works. “Publish or vanish. That’s the choice.” So they set out to compile as many of his manuscripts as possible, going head-to-head against a shady publisher, a drunken poet, shrinking resources, and their own mortality.
