Bookish Thoughts

I was absolutely shocked when my book club chose this for our November meeting. It's a huge departure from the mainstream books we usually read. So I guess it wasn't all that surprising when no one in the club actually managed to finish it. But I enjoyed getting a chance to read it again. I followed it a lot better my second time through, and I understood way more of the jokes. The sequel is still sitting on my shelf, and I can't wait to read it, and the rest of the series.

It's interesting to completely hate the ending of one book, and then finding yourself rooting for the exact same ending in a different book. But Fforde managed to write a pretty sympathetic Rochester. A Mr. Rochester that I could cheer on, and who I felt almost deserved to be happy with Jane by the end of the book. Though that could also be because he just skipped over the grosser aspects of Rochester's character, focusing on his good qualities, and the limitations imposed on him by being a fictional character. Jasper Fforde writes some really weird stuff. And while The Eyre Affair wasn't as much a trip as Shades of Grey , it was still a strange experience. Albeit, an experience that I could empathize with a bit more. This is a world that I almost want to live in. The Eyre Affair takes place in an alternate-London in 1985. In this alternate world, England has been at war with Russia for over 100 years, time travel is possible, and the boundary between fic...