Literary sleuth Thursday Next is out to save literature in the fifth installment of Jasper Fforde's wildly popular series
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reviews
Jul 23, 2007
Jack
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Thursday's back, in the first installment of her second four-book series; how I'd missed her.
Familiar ground is less familiar than I might have expected. It's 14 years later, SpecOps has been disbanded, and Thursday is working at a carpet company while England's love of reading (so prominent and charming in the world of the first series) has plummeted so far that bookstores no longer sell books and reality TV has resorted to titles like Samaritan Kidney Swap. It takes a couple of c More...
Familiar ground is less familiar than I might have expected. It's 14 years later, SpecOps has been disbanded, and Thursday is working at a carpet company while England's love of reading (so prominent and charming in the world of the first series) has plummeted so far that bookstores no longer sell books and reality TV has resorted to titles like Samaritan Kidney Swap. It takes a couple of c More...
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Feb 25, 2009
Esther
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Actually, more like 1.5 stars -- somewhere between "didn't like it" and "OK". I certainly didn't hate it, but I didn't derive much pleasure from reading it, either.
While I enjoyed the prior four books in this series, this one fell short. Much of the cleverness that made Fforde's other books so delightful has been sucked out of this book.
The "that that that that" bit in Well of Lost Plots was a bit of brilliance. This book's brilliance, unf More...
While I enjoyed the prior four books in this series, this one fell short. Much of the cleverness that made Fforde's other books so delightful has been sucked out of this book.
The "that that that that" bit in Well of Lost Plots was a bit of brilliance. This book's brilliance, unf More...
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Jul 24, 2008
Tripp
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If I have ever read a more raucous and joyful ode to reading than Jasper Fforde's Thursday Next series, then I have long forgotten it. Set in a fantastical alternate Britain, the series heroine is the titular Next who is a member of the Literary Detectives, a government organization that combats book crime, such as, say, the unlawful editing of books. How can such events occur? Well as it happens, what is written in books exists in it own dimension and if you were to enter that dimension, you co
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May 25, 2008
Kerrin
rated it: 
Probably my least favorite of the Thursday Next series so far. It seemed less coherent and more bogged down with explanation than the rest. While there were a few exciting parts near the end, I did not enjoy it as much as The Eyre Affair and others in the series.
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Feb 24, 2008
Jenny
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I have loved this quirky series, but in all honesty, I think this book had too many subplots and not enough plot to sustain the interest of anyone but a fan. Some great satire, though--I loved the reality TV shows made out of books.
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Aug 07, 2010
MissJessie
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May 19, 2008
Rachel C.
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Maybe it's because I haven't seen Thursday Next in a long time, but I really enjoyed this book!
I loved the scenes with her family - seeing son Friday as a grunty teenager whose only interest is playing guitar for his garage band, The Gobshites. (His parents are worried because he's slated to save the world 756 times, but is already three years behind schedule on his ChronoGuard career.) The scene about Thursday's daughter Jenny almost made me cry.
The plot is intricate a More...
I loved the scenes with her family - seeing son Friday as a grunty teenager whose only interest is playing guitar for his garage band, The Gobshites. (His parents are worried because he's slated to save the world 756 times, but is already three years behind schedule on his ChronoGuard career.) The scene about Thursday's daughter Jenny almost made me cry.
The plot is intricate a More...
May 10, 2008
Brownbetty
rated it:
Jasper Fforde reminds me of a Douglas Adams who came from a happier home. (I have no idea what Adams' home life was like, but for the sake of analogy, humour me.) His humour is less biting, but just as madcap, his characters are kinder, and easier to like, but the surreality is, I think, just as strong, and listen to this nice bit of language on pianos: "Composed of 550lbs of iron, wood, strings, and felt, the 88-key instrument is capable of the most subtle of melodies, yet stored up in
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Sep 12, 2007
Eviltwinjen
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Ah, Jasper Fforde. I missed you while you were writing the Nursery Crimes books, in which I just couldn't work up much interest. Thursday is what makes these books work--she's loveably contradictory and hard-assed, but also a doting mum who can't stop calling her son "Sweetpea", even when he's an adult version of himself from the future who's threatening to replace her actual (lazy no-good) teenaged son in the present.
In First Among Sequels, the beginning of a new quartet More...
In First Among Sequels, the beginning of a new quartet More...
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Aug 31, 2007
Leigh
rated it:
Seriously, Jasper Fforde. This has gone far enough.
I thought The Eyre Affair was pretty ingenious. As the series continued, the books seemed to start to fall into a hole, but as the holder of an English B.A. and M.A., I was sticking with Fforde for his clever puns, literary allusions, Shakespeare references, and other literature-related nonsense. I was particularly fond of The Well of Lost Plots, not because it was terribly good, but as a writer I appreciated the fantasy of Bookworl More...
I thought The Eyre Affair was pretty ingenious. As the series continued, the books seemed to start to fall into a hole, but as the holder of an English B.A. and M.A., I was sticking with Fforde for his clever puns, literary allusions, Shakespeare references, and other literature-related nonsense. I was particularly fond of The Well of Lost Plots, not because it was terribly good, but as a writer I appreciated the fantasy of Bookworl More...
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May 31, 2007
Erin
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I managed to acquire an advanced copy of the book, the 5th in the Thursday Next series.
I love the series, but I think this is the weakest of them. It's not as compulsively can't-put-it-down readable as the rest of the series, and there are way too many apparently disparate plot threads, which, granted, all come together in the end, but make the novel hard to follow early on. It's also not nearly as suspenseful as the earlier novels: none of the conflicts seem all that urgent, there' More...
I love the series, but I think this is the weakest of them. It's not as compulsively can't-put-it-down readable as the rest of the series, and there are way too many apparently disparate plot threads, which, granted, all come together in the end, but make the novel hard to follow early on. It's also not nearly as suspenseful as the earlier novels: none of the conflicts seem all that urgent, there' More...
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Feb 25, 2009
Sandi
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According to the little pop-up under each star, two stars means "it was okay". And, that's about all I can say about this 5th installment in Jasper Fforde's Thursday Next series. It was in serious trouble when 75 of the first 100 pages were spent in a pointless jaunt through Book World that seemed to be there only to provide exposition that fans of the series don't really need. Fforde throws out a lot of potential story lines and doesn't follow through with most of them. Absolutely
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Jul 08, 2008
Heather
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Jasper Fforde is brilliant. Where will the man's imagination take us next?! This series is an incredibly creative literary fantasy that involves the main character, Thursday Next, jumping between the BookWorld and the Outland (that's where we live).
She solves mysteries and puts literary crimes to rights. We learn all sorts of things along the way about how books are actually created and transferred to the author and the reader.
If you love books and don't mind a few para More...
She solves mysteries and puts literary crimes to rights. We learn all sorts of things along the way about how books are actually created and transferred to the author and the reader.
If you love books and don't mind a few para More...
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Sep 09, 2011
Myfavoritegeorgie
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Jan 30, 2009
Gayle
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I gave myself a breather between this one and Something Rotten, and a good thing I did. I found this one a lot more readable. Thursday is employed by Acme Carpets, which is a front for her Spec Ops group (Spike, Stig, et al), which is a front for her Jurisfiction activities. As Thursday tries to work with assorted versions of herself, she tackles issues of falling Outworld readership, Goliath Corporation's upcoming Austen Rover, and her dead Uncle Mycroft, who has been making ghostly appearances
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Dec 11, 2008
Jill
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My sentiments on reading First Among Sequels was very similar to that when I read the Gaiman/Pratchett collaboration, Good Omens. Fforde's done a great job in the earlier books in the Thursday Next series, creating this crazy alternative universe called the BookWorld and how books are we know it aren't products of an author's imagination, but are really the result of feats of BookWorld engineering. Some bits of the book are just brilliant - Superreaders, what happens when a novel like Pride an
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Oct 09, 2011
Michelle
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Thursday is in her 50s, and Friday is 16 with a mathematical genius younger sister, Tuesday. While pretending to work an ordinary job providing quality floor coverings to the population of Swindon, she continues to police the BookWorld. There's a plot involving a serial killer amongst the books which is rather a side consideration. The real drama is that the Generic who was developed to play Thursday in her books 1-4 is a sex-and-violence obsessed maniac, while book 5's Thursday is a milquetoast
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Jul 02, 2011
Cathy
rated it:
First Line: The dangerously high level of the stupidity surplus was once again the lead story in The Owl that morning.
I stumbled across the first book in this series on a table at a local Barnes & Noble. The only reason why I bought The Eyre Affair was that I am a Jane Eyre fan-- and the plot sounded like fun. Little did I know what I was getting myself into! There is a reason why the books in this series are consistently nominated for (or winners of) the Dilys Award-- they are so fi More...
I stumbled across the first book in this series on a table at a local Barnes & Noble. The only reason why I bought The Eyre Affair was that I am a Jane Eyre fan-- and the plot sounded like fun. Little did I know what I was getting myself into! There is a reason why the books in this series are consistently nominated for (or winners of) the Dilys Award-- they are so fi More...
Jun 18, 2011
Elliott
rated it:
In the wake of reading the most recent Thursday Next novel, 'One of Our Thursdays is Missing', I found myself reaching for this volume, and re-reading it, in doing so, I discovered that 'One of our Thursdays...' is actually a kind of re-boot of 'First Among Sequels'(TN-5).
This is interesting, because I hadn't realized that the practice was becoming commonplace, or could work so well, but I've noted it in the work of at least one other writer in my reading of late (John Scalzi's 'Zoe More...
This is interesting, because I hadn't realized that the practice was becoming commonplace, or could work so well, but I've noted it in the work of at least one other writer in my reading of late (John Scalzi's 'Zoe More...
May 29, 2011
Marcia
rated it:
Two and a half stars. Years ago, I read and enjoyed the first four Thursday Next books, but this one is basically a mess from start to finish. I'm going to assume that the quality fell off quite a bit with this book, though it is possible they've been sloppily written all this time and I'm just noticing now. Fforde has a gift for satire, and occasionally he's spot on. If you were just reading a handful of pages at a time, this book would seem quite clever and fun. As a whole, however, it doesn't
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Jul 28, 2010
Julia
rated it:
I have NO idea why Fforde delights me so much in his Thursday Next series--possibly his juxtaposition of such a down-to-earth heroine with this OUTRAGEOUS world she inhabits!
This sequel to the main four books in the Next series (which I've already reviewed on goodreads), continues in the zany form of the other works. Thursday is now a woman in her 50's, married to Landon, with three (she thinks) children. SUPPOSEDLY she has given up all her literary detective work with SpecOps, but More...
This sequel to the main four books in the Next series (which I've already reviewed on goodreads), continues in the zany form of the other works. Thursday is now a woman in her 50's, married to Landon, with three (she thinks) children. SUPPOSEDLY she has given up all her literary detective work with SpecOps, but More...
Jun 16, 2010
Barky
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This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers.
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Apr 21, 2010
Simcha
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while I really enjoying First Among Sequels, I did have a bit of trouble getting into it in the beginning. I was a bit put off by the sixteen-year time jump as well as Thursday’s almost immediate trip to the Bookworld. Thursday’s adventures in the Bookworld aren’t my favorite parts of these books, as they feel too much like a factory tour in which I’m presented with one product after another, which are meant to dazzle me with their cleverness. This gets a bit tedious after a while and so it took
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Jan 30, 2010
Julie
rated it: 
Love it. Love the whole series. Love the author. It's literary sci-fi, literary mystery, just plain literary at it's best. Awesomely clever. Time travel, ghosts, the end of the world (caused by the end of Time), a demon, Danverclones (creepy Mrs. Danvers from du Maurier's Rebecca, cloned into an army of thousands), a "dirty bomb" that if unleashed in an inter-genre war between Racy Novel and Feminist Literature, could "scatter poorly described fornication all across drab theo
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Mar 26, 2009
Joanna
rated it:
All I can say is that half the pleasure of reading Fforde's Thursday Next series is in ferreting out the myriad literary references slipped into the work. The fifth book in the series was no different in this respect, playing in fiction, poetry and the oral tradition.
This was a really fun read that plays with Thursday as both an "outlander" and a member of Jurisfiction, the fictional version of Spec Ops (So27) policing the fictional world's woes, uncannily like and unlike More...
This was a really fun read that plays with Thursday as both an "outlander" and a member of Jurisfiction, the fictional version of Spec Ops (So27) policing the fictional world's woes, uncannily like and unlike More...
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Aug 18, 2011
Peyton
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He's done it again! When Jasper Fforde dies, his brain should be left for scientists and English professors to study.
While the entire Thursday Next series could double as serious literary criticism, this entry in particular examines the uses and purposes of fiction. It's refreshing to read fiction about reading fiction that's actually worth reading. Fforde also has the dexterity of a ventriloquist, slipping in and out of the voices of classic writers. Elizabeth Bennet's dialogue is b More...
While the entire Thursday Next series could double as serious literary criticism, this entry in particular examines the uses and purposes of fiction. It's refreshing to read fiction about reading fiction that's actually worth reading. Fforde also has the dexterity of a ventriloquist, slipping in and out of the voices of classic writers. Elizabeth Bennet's dialogue is b More...
Mar 16, 2011
Kathryn
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This book is the fifth in the series of Thursday Next surreal mystery novels by Jasper Fforde, and the first one that I hadn’t read before. It’s my understanding that with this novel, the author is starting a new set of novels, which I suppose would make this Thursday Next 2.1 (assuming that the last novel was 1.4).
It is now 2002 in the world of Thursday Next, and she and Landon Parke-Laine have three children – sixteen year old Friday, who is is the midst of teenage rebellion when h More...
It is now 2002 in the world of Thursday Next, and she and Landon Parke-Laine have three children – sixteen year old Friday, who is is the midst of teenage rebellion when h More...
Mar 27, 2011
Lucy
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Feb 17, 2011
Danielle
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Two factors in particular made this installment of Thursday Next's adventures especially fitting to my current place in the literary scheme of things. Firstly, I love Jane Austen. Secondly, I had just finished watching (the Colin Firth version of course) and rereading Pride and Prejudice. That may seem like overkill to some people, but there are a fair number of people out there that will understand. In any event, the latest news about Borders closing 200 stores and book readership being down
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Oct 31, 2007
Beth
rated it:
I didn’t find this story as exciting or innovative as the previous Thursday Next books in the series. I was a bit thrown off that about 15 years had gone by and Thursday was quite a bit older, I felt like I had lost a female character that was interesting and adventurous and near my age. The new characters just weren’t as compelling. I will likely read future books, but I hope they offer more plot and more insight into the fabulous Bookworld.
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