Something Rotten

This book is hard to rate. It's bursting with more imagination and creativity than most authors could get into ten novels; it's intermittently funny; and it works itself up into a rather spectacular extended finale.However, for at least the first half I have to push myself to get through the story. There are so many bad things going on that reading it is a mostly discouraging experience. Yes, there's a happy ending of sorts, but there are never enough good things to balance the bad; which seems to be a problem characteristic of Fforde's writing.It puts Thursday, our heroine, under such stress from all directions that her ability to stay sane and persevere is quite implausible. Most people couldn't cope with even one of the many balls she's juggling. Although she has skills and never gives up, she needs doses of luck at various key points to survive at all.Shakespeare's Hamlet appears as a character, among many others, but isn't entirely successful for me: he's quite funny but unconvincing, seeming more like a man with a Hamlet obsession than Shakespeare's actual creation. Probably the latter would be jarringly out of place in a book like this.I like Fforde's strange but engaging interpretation of Neanderthals, who appear in this story thanks to genetic engineering.Recommended if you think you might like a really bizarre science-fiction-fantasy-comedy-thriller with minor elements of love interest and child care. You should read at least [b:The Eyre Affair 27003 The Eyre Affair (Thursday Next, #1) Jasper Fforde https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1445540555l/27003.SY75.jpg 3436605] (book 1) first; you could probably cope without reading books 2 and 3, although this is book 4.

I love this story line. I love the characters, and the inclusion of literary Easter eggs all throughout. There are just bits and pieces that really annoy me. It started in the well of lost plots with the extreme lack of pregnancy knowledge and then little bits and bobs in this one just seemed lacking depth. The whole superhoop thing seemed really random, not random chaotic in the way this series excites me, but random like the author couldn't think of what to make the backbone of the story so he went with a sports game because nothing else came to mind. A lot of stuff was written as afterthoughts. Like oh yeah I forgot about this bit, let's stick it in here. Her coming back to life at the end was absurdly predictable and kind of annoying honestly. How many people can they get to take her place? Spike! Poor Spike. He could have been such a great complicated character but he was so 1 dimensional. He turns Thursday down to date this random woman that he falls in love with and she seems great in the previous book but she turns out to be super whiney in this book. The whole window maker thing was another author cop-out. ‘Couldn't figure out what to do here, so let's make her Spikes wife.' And then when she's kicks the bucket he just goes with it? No. That's inhuman.

The ending really got me though. I was possibly sobbing.

But I'm really kinda pissed about Bowden. Where the heck is he at the end? And there's this theme since book one “I'm gonna marry that woman.” But like she just pops in after 2 years and everyone just acts like she was there last week. And Fforde even touched on the romance so briefly with the Neanderthal telling him about how Bowden is ‘not able to be with the woman you truly love.' But Gran says Thursday is with Landon for over 40 years. What was even up with that fortune telling? Geez I really hope the author uses that in the upcoming books because what a waste.

Ugh. Why did I want Fforde to kill off Landon so bad? I felt like it was what I would have wrote honestly. Like it was required to happen for the story to be told.

Bringing up the pregnancy thing again, I realize Fforde is a guy, but he has literally no idea what it's like to be a mom at all.


Where the hell did Mycroft and Polly come from?! At the end of the Eyre Affair it said -and she never saw them again- which really bothered me at the time because I really thought they really made the book so great. I love the going through books thing, but I wanted more crazy ingenuity. Still, the ‘oh yeah Mycroft and Polly came back after we did some random bit we're not actually going to tell you about, but it was crazy, you should have been there.'

Thursday is now head of Jurisfiction, her 2yr old son Friday close to her hip. It's time for her to return to the outside and find a way to reactualize her husband Landen. When she returns home she find things are not as they were.

Yorrick Kaine is back and wreaking his usual havoc, this time set on world domination. The Goliath Corporation is still up to their tricks, this time attempting to become a faith-based system. Kaine and Goliath are linked together so if one succeeds they both win.

How can Thursday get Goliath to reactualize Landen while, at the same time, bring them and Kaine down once and for all?

This is by far my favorite series (outside of Harry Potter). It is packed full of bookish characters, crazy scenarios and sci-fi madness. A fun series that has me laughing often.

Although I loved the third book the most because it took place in the BookWorld and I just loved the idea around that, this fourth volume is just as zany, bizarre, fun and funny, but with a satisfying conclusion. I couldn't help thinking of the Doctor's words ‘Timey Whimy' as I read the final chapters. A big reveal at the end was surprising and yet really quite emotional and touching. The amazing imagination that Fforde displays in these books is beyond compare and the journey with Thursday Next was so much fun, I look forward to continuing with the second half of the series and can't wait to see what absurdity Fforde will take me to next!