Thursday Next has become a fifteen minute legend for stopping the multinational Goliath Corporation from extending the Crimean War in order to sell weapons (see The Eyre Affair). However, fame proves nasty for Thursday especially following her Monday appearance on the Lush show.

However, Thursday has more pressing matters than making TV appearances (considered heresy for a literary type) because her archenemy Goliath has deleted her beloved Landon. To reconstitute Landon, Thursday must first enter the taboo Poe pages of the Raven. Feeling initially hopeless, Thursday receives Great Expectations when Miss Havisham takes her under her wings. Thursday next starts a book-hopping journey as an obtruding character with more than just Landon at stake. She struggles LOST IN A GOOD BOOK with the world in grave danger.

Fans of classic literature will either love or hate Jasper Fforde’s latest literary jabbing. The story line is satirical at its most humorous best as Mr. Fforde leads the laughs at what is a masterpiece and how society shreds and re-shreds every line looking for generation nuances to reinterpret. From the Bard to Kafka to Poe, no work is safe from the amusing interloping of Jasper Fforde, who makes his cast especially Thursday fit quite comfortably inside some of the masterpieces. Readers wanting something different or a chance to strike back at that English teacher who nuked literature will say evermore lost in this great book.

Harriet Klausner