PEI-based author Steven Mayoff’s newest novel Poor Man’s Opera will be released on August 15 by Moncton, NB-based press, Galleon Books.

Poor Man’s Opera is a wildly radical reimagining of William Shakespeare’s play Measure for Measure. Set in a remote future where Canada is known as the Northlands and has been annexed by its authoritarian neighbour to the south, the Free Republic of America, where there used to be provinces and territories, there are now self-governing city-states spread out through a wilderness ravaged of its natural resources.

The story is set in the city-state of New Old York (at one time Toronto) and narrated by a gender-fluid Tarot reader who is an unofficial advisor to a high-ranking politician. Mayoff has written his novel in a faux Shakespearean language, mixed with modern colloquialisms, a smattering of French and hiphop and his own invented rhyming slang. 

Upcoming is a related musical side-project that is set to give the novel a unique promotional boost.