Maggie O'Farrell's historical fiction narrative Hamnet is an intergenerational tale of grief and resilience for a family affected by the bubonic plague in late sixteenth-century England. Through rotating third-person perspectives and an omniscient narrator, O'Farrell weaves a wrenching family saga saturated with themes of loss, love, healing, and fate from lesser-known facts about playwright William Shakespeare's wife and children in Stratford. The narrative begins with the titular character Hamnet's attempts to help his ailing twin sister and ends shortly after his untimely death, which inspires his father to compose the now-famous theatrical tragedy, Hamlet.
