Play Book Tag discussion

Jasper Fforde is very clever and I have read (and enjoyed) most of his books.  I took a hiatus from reading him, and coincidentally he took a hiatus from writing.  This is his first post creativity-hiatus novel and it's what you would expect from Jasper Fforde.  A little too much of what you would expect, as it happens.

This story does not take place in the book world, but the novel is structured similarly.   If you've read Fforde you know that means each chapter has a header from a fictional book about the world he's writing about, and its peppered with footnotes which tend to be humorous, (but for me not humorous enough to disrupt the story, so I ended up skipping them.)

There is no doubt this book is clever!  A unique take on a "thriller."  Fun characters, original concepts, and plenty of twists (somewhat predictable) and turns.  I think the novel would have been much more successful without the Fforde structure.  Leave off the headers and footers, and just tell the story.  About 2/3rds of the way through I stopped reading the headers because they just weren't adding anything to the story and I was starting to wonder if I'd ever finish.  Also, I never laughed which is really unusual for me and a Fforde novel.

Actually, I think this book would be really suited to audio.  With a hot chocolate, and a blanket or 3.  

Enjoyable and entertaining, but ultimately a bit disappointing.

I four starred it, but I know exactly what you mean. It’s a ridiculously imaginative alternative Britain, with many of the great themes he always brings to his books. But it was slightly too much of the usual, without quite the normal level of amusement along the way. The footnotes didn’t bug me at the time as I think I tuned them out, but you’re quite right - they’re overdone. I did get some laughs (and snarfs) otherwise I’d have marked it down harder - the narrator’s sarky comments were classic Fforde hilarious at times - but the whole thing was a bit more of an effort and definitely not as light hearted as Shades of Grey, or the early Thursday Next books.

I keep thinking about the book, it really stuck with me, and i think I'm enjoying it more in retrospect, but you know, don't make it so hard!