Jasper Fforde
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Jasper Fforde is a novelist and aviator from Stroud in Gloucestershire, UK.
His early career was spent as a focus puller in the movie industry. His published books are a series of novels starring Thursday Next: The Eyre Affair (2001), Lost In A Good Book (2002), The Well Of Lost Plots (2003), and Something Rotten (2004). A new novel, which had the working title of Nursery Crimes, is due to be released on July 21 2005, as The Big Over Easy: A Nursery Crime. It is apparently to be set in the same alternative universe as the Thursday Next series, but will introduce a new set of characters including Inspector Jack Spratt and Sergeant Mary Mary.
Mr Fforde's books are noted for the number of literary allusions, wordplay and the tightly scripted plot, and also the impossibility of deciding which genre they fit into. The simple answer is that they don't, although they all have elements of metafiction, parody, and fantasy.
Mr Fforde should also be noted for his use of the internet to add a different level to the books at ThursdayNext.com (http://www.thursdaynext.com/) and talks directly to his fans through comments on the Fforum (http://www.jasperfforde.com/phorum/index.php?f=0), which has attracted a small community producing parodies and nonsense roughly connected to the 'Nextian Universe'.
Another way to engage readers has been through the insertion of rogue postcards into copies of the books which now sell for not inconsiderable sums, as well as guerilla signings, which often confuse purchasers of his books.
External Links
- Jasper Fforde's Web site (http://www.jasperfforde.com/)
- ThursdayNext.com (http://www.thursdaynext.com/)
- Jasper Fforde Ffan Club (http://www.jasperffordeffanclub.com/)
- Home of the new series of Nursery Crime books (http://www.nurserycrime.co.uk/home.html)
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