Reviews TN3 Voices From The Vaults Review

Imagine a world where books are more coveted than gold. Instead of robbing banks, criminals steal manuscripts. They forge Byronic verse. They plot to kill classic literary characters. They argue and fight over Shakespeare.

In Jasper Fforde's The Eyre Affair, none of these crimes is unheard of. In fact, a special police force is designed to protect works of literature from evil hands

. The novel's heroine, Thursday Next, is a London ''literary detective'' devoted to preserving classic works. When the villainous Acheron Hades kidnaps her uncle, steals a Charles Dickens manuscript and traps her aunt in a Wordsworth poem, Thursday -- a cross between Wonder Woman and Bridget Jones -- is called to duty.

Not only are books highly regarded, but, in The Eyre Affair's universe, everything is possible: The Crimean War persists, airplanes have been replaced by drifting ''gasbags,'' and endangered animals are cloned and kept as pets. (Dodos are all the rage.)

Fforde's imaginative novel will satiate readers looking for a Harry Potteresque tale. Aside from Rowling's addictive prose, The Eyre Affair's literary wonderland recalls Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's series, the works of Lewis Carroll and Woody Allen's The Kugelmass Episode.

''When I was a kid, I used to enjoy Douglas Adams a huge amount because I loved that conceptual writing,'' Fforde says. ''Ideas that I couldn't think up I always found very, very appealing.''

Fforde's use of inside jokes and pop-culture references is fun, but not overdone. In a scene that recalls The Rocky Horror Picture Show's cult status, Thursday attends an interactive performance of Richard III, complete with a screaming, enthusiastic audience (in costume, of course).

''Certainly whenever I read anything it's instantly incorporated into the book,'' Fforde says. ''It's like doing a sort of jigsaw puzzle with words. I think it's amusing for the readership because they're actually seeing things that they've also grown up with.''

At the novel's climax, Hades and his cohorts capture the original manuscript to Jane Eyre and plot to alter its contents. A special invention allows characters to enter Charlotte Bronte's novel and interact with Jane and Mr. Rochester. The results are highly entertaining, even to those who may not remember the book from their high school English class.

While the action-packed story focuses on Thursday's crime fighting, the heart of The Eyre Affair is a love story. When she's not being charmed by Rochester or fighting off a werewolf, Thursday contemplates her lost love, Landen Parke-Laine, now engaged to another woman.

It's no surprise this fast-paced novel reads like a movie; for almost 20 years, Fforde worked in the film industry as a camera operator.

''It was a great ringside seat for watching how movies are being made without actually being caught up in the politics of moviemaking,'' Fforde says.

The Eyre Affair is Fforde's first novel, and it took him about five years to write. It's complemented by a strong presence in cyberspace. A network of Web sites, including thursdaynext.com and jasperfforde.com, give readers a greater glimpse into Thursday's world as well as a personal connection with Fforde, who designed the sites.

''When I was a kid I always enjoyed watching those 'making of' movies,'' Fforde says. ''I loved seeing those and all the tinkering that goes behind the scenes. And I thought if I could do something like that for my book, just give little hints here and there, then it might be rather fun. . . . It's a direct connection with the author.''

But even with the Web sites, many details in The Eyre Affair go unexplained. Characters drift in and out of scenes, and dangling details lurk in every chapter -- well every chapter except Chapter 13, which is mysteriously missing from the book.

Fforde says The Eyre Affair is part of a series, and loose ends will be resolved in future books. He's completed the second Thursday Next novel, due in 2003. (Great Expectations' Miss Havisham plays a major role.) He envisions at least five books in the series.

''I love the idea of all my books linking together,'' Fforde says. ''So sometimes I actually leave things in which actually give me something to play with later. It's like Easter eggs, you know? I think there are lots of Easter eggs in the book that people might not know the relevance of until Book Two or Book Three.''

Whitney Matheson for USA Today Thu Feb 21, 2002