The Eyre Affair, Jasper Fforde

This is one of those popular books that if you haven't read, you certainly must have heard about.

Meet Thursday Next, a detective in a world that is a little more advanced and differently prioritised to ours. They have detectives for every branch of the world - Thursday is a detective in the literary genre. Which means she polices texts and their characters or those who attempt to harm them.

In the Eyre Affair, as suggested, she wanders into Jane Eyre's world, albeit unintentionally and thwarts a criminal mastermind who intends to exert his influence and add ctredibility to his criminal status by altering the Eyre world. Great story - the characters are sufficient. I just didn't enjoy this in the beginning or at the end.

It takes a while to adjust to the world and its terms and traditions. Then the story gains momentum through Thursday's interactions with her nemisis and his plans, as well as her family a little later. The back and forwards in time and her fight to save Jane Eyre is great - well executioned and it really keeps a hold on your attention.

Then we have a sudden wedding at the end and its all ruined. Sure, weddings are great - but only when the reader can see they are coming, or their an expectation that this is where the story is going. In this case, Thursday's wedding is really quite sudden and for me, it was thrown in largely I think to consolidate that Thursday, being a female character requires a wedding to be complete.

As a reader I was severely disappointed when it appears everyone lives happily ever after - I love happy endings but only when its clear that the story aims to do so, when its thrown in the way Thursday's tale ends, I think its incredibly cliche and stereotypical. Surely in the day and age we live in a wedding isn't the be all and end all of our lives?

3*s but only read this if you don't mind plot devices thrown in unexpectedly.