The Eyre Affair

Pirouetting on the boundaries between sci-fi, the crime thriller and intertextual whimsy, Jasper Fforde's outrageous The Eyre Affairputs you on the wrong footing even on its dedication page, which proudly announces that the book conforms to Crimean War economy standard.

Fforde's heroine, Thursday Next, lives in a world where time and reality are endlessly mutable--someone has ensured that the Crimean War never ended for example--a world policed by men like her disgraced father, whose name has been edited out of existence. She herself polices text--against men like the Moriarty-like Acheron Styx, whose current scam is to hold the minor characters of Dickens' novels to ransom, entering the manuscript and abducting them for execution and extinction one by one. When that caper goes sour, Styx moves on to the nation's most beloved novel--an oddly truncated version of Jane Eyre--and kidnaps its heroine. The phlegmatic and resourceful Thursday pursues Acheron across the border into a Leninist Wales and further to Mr Rochester's Thornfield Hall, where both books find their climax on the roof amid flames.

Fforde is endlessly inventive: his heroine's utter unconcern about the strangeness of the world she inhabits keeps the reader perpetually double-taking as minor certainties of history, literature and cuisine go soggy in the corner of our eye. The audacity of the premise and its working out provides sudden leaps of understanding, many of them accompanied by wild fits of the giggles. This is a peculiarly promising first novel. --Roz Kaveney

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A LOT of fun... - Rated
Having read two of the Thursday Next books (and about to start my third), I'd just like to say that I agree with some of the points raised about characterisation being a little one-dimensional at times. However, I think that doesn't detract from the overall fun and flavour of the book(s) at all. I'm having a whale of a time in Jasper's world! The quirkiness is just right because there are enough real-world analogies to hang onto. Anyone know where I can get a re-engineered thylacine?

not quite as good as I thought it was going to be - Rated
I had a lot of hype from people about the book, and while I did enjoy it, I thought it was a little misnamed as the main plot of the book wasn't about Jane Eyre, but other books too - perhaps it was considered to be more attention grabbing that the Little Dorrit scandal or something.

Thursday was a little blank for me, perhaps because it was a male writer? And I wasn't convinced by the overwhelming love with her and her man, but perhaps that's an arc to be continued. I'd certainly get the next one, though and see how it went.

Some really funny bits, but a lot of loose ends, and not really enough explanation of how things were done.

Not as good as I expected - Rated
I really wanted to rave about this book, as its creative, innovative, unusual, witty and clever. But I found it hard to stick with and got bored; the story, plot and characters didn't grab me, and the style of writing began to irritate after a few pages. :(

Who you gotta call? - Thursday Next! - Rated
My friend bought me 'The Eyre Affair' at the end of last year and I admit I was somewhat cautious about reading, I did not think I would enjoy it, well I was totally WRONG!, I read it in 2 days and enjoyed it immensely.

Thursday Next is a great character, she does not hide her flaws, finds herself in situations that are slightly bizarre while worrying about her love life and the state of her hair. A laugh out loud book. I am officially hooked and I am currently reading 'Something Rotten', the 4th book in the series.

Love this book! - Rated
What an amazing book! Brilliant, original idea, well played out - it had me panting for the next one in the series. There should be a law passed obliging Jasper fforde to write at least one Thursday Next book a year.