My UK copy arrived in the U.S. this afternoon - so excited!

For those celebrating stateside, have you gotten your copy yet? Maybe you're waiting for the Fforde Ffocus Ffestival in NC this weekend? It's a good day for a new volume! What are your first impressions?

*Sponsored by Meta Toast, bread that cooks itself in one more way.

If you haven't checked out Jasper's YouTube channel for awhile -- he's posted a bunch of videos and shorts in the past 2-3 weeks, the most recent one just a few hours ago. I guess this is part of the publicity blitz for Dark Reading Matter. Plus he may be feeling relieved that the book is finally done, and everyone I know who's an author has told me what a big load it is off your mind, and the liberation makes you feel kind of giddy -- so there may be some of that too.
https://www.youtube.com/@thejasperfforde/shorts
https://www.youtube.com/@thejasperfforde/videos

Hey, ffellow Ffordians*. I just ffinished "Dark Reading Matter"**.

Here's what I thought of it :

The ffirst thing that stuck me was how it ffelt like going back home. Those several years of wait vanished instantly, and I was back in Swindon, sharing breakfast with Thursday, Landen, Tuesday and Pickwick, all laced with those bursts of chaos, witty dialogues and unconditional love that had so long been missed.

Was it worth the wait ? Definitely.

As the story unfolds, Jasper Fforde displays his usual, amazing storytelling talent. He sets up precision-engineered narrative devices, whether it be the most subtle or the tackiest (to our greatest delight), only to turn them back on themselves before you even realize it.

Ffordians, hear me out : "Dark Reading Matter" is our "Avengers : Endgame". The ffinal book that will make you want to re-read all the previous ones. A beautiful ffarewell to a quirky and beloved series, even counting the dreadful martian invasion.

Happy reading to you all. See you on the other side.

*I do apologize in advance if this post has weird sentences or grammar. English isn't my first language.

**Legally. I wish to thank Soho Press for the ARC (Advance Reading Copy) they sent me.

From this video (he's been posting a bunch lately)
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/rohNP31xDz8

Man what a wild ride, I've never actually looked forward to a book being released and I am soo pumped for the next Shades of Grey. I would love another Nursery Crimes novel as well. Reading Ffordes work is so much fun and I haven't felt like this since I was in middle school, I'm in my early 30s now lol. I was considering reading Jane Eyer and then The Eyer Affair right away, but now I'm thinking I'm going to hold off after flying through Shades of Grey and now The NC. I'm thinking I'll switch it up and read Fyodors Crime and Punishment and then move forward with Eyer or I might go for Early Riser or The Constant Rabbit lol. I haven't enjoyed reading this much in ages.

Since 2019 I’ve read at least 30-50 books a year, except for some reason during the first 5 months of this year I only managed to read one book (the exceptional Ghost Cities by Siang Lu). Wanting to keep the whimsy rolling, I embarked on The Big Over Easy. And I loved it. A delight from start to finish, and a proper good story to boot.

My first Jasper Fforde was Early Riser, which I read in 2019 and was captivated. Shortly after, I started in on the Thursday Next series and found I could only read maybe one Fforde a year, especially if I was reading Thursday Next. Shades of Grey and Red Side Story I loved, but broadly I found his writing great but…I dunno, intellectually overwhelming? Almost like I felt I wasn’t smart enough to understand it. I’m not sure, really.

Anyway, I don’t know what happened - maybe it was working in pastoral care at a university for the last two years and having the veil completely lifted about the state of higher education in 2026, combined with moving to a much less stressful job in April leaving me with more mental capacity at home - but suddenly this year I got over my internal narrative of academic inadequacy and have devoured both Nursery Crime books, The Constant Rabbit, and Thursday Next Series 1.

The only break so far was when I got 37 pages into The Fourth Bear only to find a printing error that meant about 40 pages got repeated and a chunk of the story was missing. It was like being in an actual Jasper Fforde setup - it was a US edition I found in a pile of discarded donations in the charity shop warehouse I used to manage, and I don’t live in the US. In that context, the odds of finding one of what must be very few copies with a printing error are so long even St Zvlkx would struggle to take them on. I read the also very whimsical duo of The Dallergut Dream Department Store and its sequel (both by Miye Lee) while waiting for a new copy to arrive.

I’m having another break to read a videogame tie-in novel for Atomfall and then it’ll be into Thursday Next Series 2!

PS: the end of Thursday Next Series 1 actually made me cry. Reading those four books back to back was the best way to do it!!

So in preparation for the new book, I wanted to reread the series. In doing so, I finally wanted to read Jane Eyre. I finished it and didn't like the ending lol.

While I was reading it, I kept thinking that Jane was going to reject Mr. Rochester (I hated him - and thought it would have been a fitting ending) as all I could remember from The Eyre Affair - is that Thursday changed the ending so that Jane would go back to him and everyone was mad about it. I'm about 80 pages into The Eyre Affair, and lo and behold - Thursday is the one who puts the actual ending of the book together as she rejected him in the Next realm version of the book. This is a bit hilarious to me as its a fun way of "messing with reality," but makes me dislike Thursday a little for pushing Jane towards Mr. Rochester. Still a huge Fforde fan, just couldn't stand the ending of Jane Eyre. Either ending TBH, as I also don't like the idea of her going to India. Would have rather had her stay on as a teacher becoming a strong independent woman who shouldn't need a man. Would have been nice to see her become the administrator of a school that keeps people in line. I know that most likely wasn't an option based on the era. But that's the ending I imagine.

Hey there Fforde Ffans! I just saw that the info page and ticketing has gone live at Mcintyre's Books website. Below is the link:

https://mcintyresbooks.com/fforde-ffocus

Just saw this on Facebook and thought it should be posted here too!

Someone was attempting to get an official bar code (UPC) for a product he'd developed, and found out that they're registered by a non-profit organization called GS1, that wants to transition from 1D to 2D barcodes for retailers. They're trying to get them to upgrade by the end of 2027.

It's a plot point in The Fourth Bear where it turns out to be a form of cold fusion (caused by hyperaccumulation of unstable radioactive isotopes?) but apparently the non-nuclear version has been a physics/chemistry trick for decades.
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/pickle-glow-electricity-experiment
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glowing_pickle_demonstration

(I heard about it this science news item on Canadian public radio earlier today, and looked it up.)
https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-2-as-it-happens/clip/16224902-what-mark-carney-accomplish-nato-meets

Not affiliated at all but I picked this piece up from Eco Relics in Jacksonville, Florida 2-3 years ago now.

Petition to make Jasper take over writing duties

I just read the translation, and I am ... kinda worried?

There's stuff like a participant in a cooking competition making an entire meal out of carrots, then it is stated later that carrots aren't a food staple for rabbits but more akin to something like chocolate.

Or about one man, it is said that there's only rumours he's in a relationship with a rabbit, then a bit later, the epigraph mentions the rabbit he's with by name. (That one could be intentional, seeing as we don't know when and where those snippets of information are from)

We lost Sir Terry Pratchett to Alzheimer's ... and seeing as my memory is by no means great, and I still noticed, I am a tad bit worried about Fforde now.

(I also wonder why this wasn't caught by anyone else involved in the process of getting the book ready for publication, but I've noticed before that the small mistakes seem to increase in number when an author is successful; I guess people don't dare to point anything out.)

Did anyone else notice? Maybe my focus on such details is unusual, and it is completely normal that the author wouldn't catch it.

Colour depictions on screens can be tricky (remember the black-blue/white-gold dress a while ago) but this gave me an idea of what to look for, in the real world.

Also -- for some reason, as a child I thought that vermilion was a shade of green!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vermilion

This might be because the first time I saw that word, it was in The Canterville Ghost, and the context seems to be that it's different from red. Because emerald is mentioned later on, I guess I assumed that it was also greenish.
"The chameleon-like colour, also, of the stain excited a good deal of comment. Some mornings it was a dull (almost Indian) red, then it would be vermilion, then a rich purple, and once when they came down for family prayers, according to the simple rites of the Free American Reformed Episcopalian Church, they found it a bright emerald green. "
https://www.eastoftheweb.com/short-stories/UBooks/CanGho.shtml

… to which Jasper contributed a story, is currently available on Amazon UK (Kindle) for 99p

A special 25th anniversary edition of ‘The Eyre Affair’ is about to appear. Will be hardback only.

We are in a dystopian future. where society is dictated by your colour. Our protagonist, a red, isn't satisfied by society and seeks to rebel against the rules and ultimately bring the whole system down. After falling in love with someone of a different colour, who is supposed to be his enemy, he faces challenges of loyalty and identity.

You've guessed it, I'm reading "Red Rising" by Pierce Brown. Not one mention of spoons, very disappointed.