All right, first let me say that I am a fan of Jasper Fforde. I saw him at an author event for one of the Thursday Next books - he's brilliant and funny and o so creative. I LOVE his ideas.
And therein lies the problem. I love his ideas - the Thursday Next series (starting with The Eyre Affair) is a fabulous idea - literary crime - characters in books are kidnapped and it is Thursday Next's job to return the characters to the novels in which they belong. brilliant. However, what I found is that there were many subplots and disgressions that took away from the book(s).
And here is the first book in his next series - The Big Over Easy - "A Nursery Crime" - Humpty Dumpty has indeed fallen off of a wall - BUT - was it suicide??? Or murder????? Jack Spratt investigates. There are many intrigues within the nursery crime division of the police - as you can imagine it doesn't have quite the credibility of solving other, more 'important' crimes.
Again I LOVE the idea. The execution is as good as the idea - though I must say this has been my favorite Fforde book so far. His next nursery crime book - The Fourth Bear.....well, I'm registering that one too. You can see what I think about that one in that journal entry.

...putting as a book spiral with its sequel, The Fourth Bear.

making this book an international ray...participants so far...

chambejd - Massachusetts
awakeagain - New Jersey
Karenzero - New York
ajsmom - BC, Canada
snoopy3 - Connecticut
Magika - Norway
iliotropio - Belgium

This arrived today to start the ray! Thanks so much for letting me read this. It looks great!

I'm so sorry to have had this book so long. I really had a hard time reading large chunks at a time for some reason. It took me a while to start to enjoy the story, but I did about a third of the way in. I finally finished this book in the wee hours of this morning.

My boyfriend also read this while I was wading through it and he thought it was a fun and entertaining book. (This did not cause my delay in getting through the book.)

I have awakeagain's address and will be dropping this off at the post office today.

Thanks, smilingheron, for letting me (us) read it!

Rec'd today at lunchtime and I'm about a third through it. It's a terrific book and I can't wait to read more Fforde!

One of the very best parts of this book are the chapter headings that are articles from newspapers; some of them made me laugh out loud and chase down family members to read them out loud. I read the Eyre Affair recently and enjoyed it very much. Now that I'm aware of the Fforde books, I want to read them all. I already ordered all the Thursday Next books for my daughter's Christmas present. On it's way to KarenZero in the next day or so.

Received safely! Will read ASAP.

Hope to finish this before Thanksgiving - sorry for the delay!

Woo hoo! Caught today, thank you!

Funny and easy to read, as usual. Two reasons why I love Jasper Fforde, right there! I love all the literary references - and will have this book on its way tomorrow!

Received on Saturday, will begin to read this evening. Thanks for including me!

This was a good read -- it took some time to get into, but the mid to end of the book just flew by quite quickly. I definitely look forward to reading more from DCI Jack Spratt & Mary Mary. Although the Thursday Next series will remain my absolute favorite. Contacting Magika so this book can continue on its way. -- update: Magika asked to be skipped; contacting iliotropio. -- update 2/12- Mailing out to iliotropio this weekend.

Arrived safely in Brussels. Thank you snoopy3!

On the table with free books, in the entrance hall.