The Eyre Affair Book Review

The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde

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Blurb:

Welcome to a surreal version of Great Britain, circa 1985, where time travel is routine, cloning is a reality (dodos are the resurrected pet of choice), and literature is taken very, very seriously. England is a virtual police state where an aunt can get lost (literally) in a Wordsworth poem, militant Baconians heckle performances of Hamlet, and forging Byronic verse is a punishable offense. All this is business as usual for Thursday Next, renowned Special Operative in literary detection, until someone begins kidnapping characters from works of literature. When Jane Eyre is plucked from the pages of Bronte's novel, Thursday must track down the villain and enter a novel herself to avert a heinous act of literary homicide. 

Review by Brittany:

I had heard good things about Jasper Fforde and was told that, especially as a reader, I would enjoy these books.

Jumping into this first one was a little strange as I had to get used to the different parts of the world. The different characters, the different special ops teams, and the goings on were a bit of an adjustment to other books that I've read.

I absolutely loved the idea of characters from books coming out and people getting to go in. As a reader, there have been so many times when I've wished I could do just that, and there was a certain appeal to reading about that happening in this book. I was also really intrigued by the major crime being that Hades was trying to alter literature by kidnapping the main characters. It's an interesting idea and one that would probably be just as detrimental as this book made it seem like it would be.

I also loved how Fforde included details about Thursday's personal life. The reader gets to meet her family members and develops and understanding of what is going on with her and Landen, the man she was once engaged to. Even though the basis of the book is about Thursday's job, I was so pleased to get to know her on a more personal level.

This book is written in such a way that it's almost wink-and-nod with it's sometimes subtle and sometimes unsubtle humor. With character names like Jack Schitt, it's hard to take this book too seriously. Once I got past the initial adjustment period, I couldn't put this one down. I loved this book and I'm looking forward to reading the next in the series!

Noteable quotes:

I found myself wondering what it would be like to have children and then wondering what it would be like never to know.

If only life were that simple; if one could jump to the good parts and flick through the bad...

"Life for you is short; far too short to allow small jealousies to infringe on the happiness which can be yours only for the briefest of times."

"Human emotions, well...they're just a fathomless collection of greys and I don't do so well on the midtones."