It’s no secret that I’m a massive fan of Fforde’s The Eyre Affair and its sequels, but for some reason I had never ventured into any of his other novels. Fforde did a live chat with the Guardian recently, which reminded me of this fact, and prompted me to give this series, “Nursery Crimes”, a go.
Continue reading The Big Over Easy and The Fourth Bear
On page one of this novel, Oreo’s paternal grandmother and maternal grandfather, on receiving the news that their offspring would be marrying a black woman and a Jewish man (respectively), are gripped by racist outrage so powerful that it paralyses one of them and kills the other outright. On page three, the author sets out a scale, numbered one to ten, according to which black skin tone can be categorised; she describes her characters using this scale as they are introduced. To call this novel transgressive would be an understatement.
Continue reading Oreo