Pride and Prejudice: The Reality Show
We imagine that reading the headline of this post made many of our Gentle Readers scream and cover their hands with their head, but fear not, Janeites: It’s not some crazed TV executive, but the latest book by Jasper Fforde, First Among Sequels.
In The Eyre Affair,Next confronts an arch-villain who has been killing off minor characters in Dickens, then kidnaps Jane Eyre. In Next’s fifth and latest adventure, First Among Sequels, published in early July, she investigates the premature deaths of Sherlock Holmes and Miss Marple, Pride and Prejudice is turned into a reality show called The Bennets and she meets a fictional Thursday Next – herself from a previous Fforde book.
If anyone can pull this off brilliantly, it’s Jasper Fforde, from whom we are waiting to hear in reference to our proposal of marriage. (Bally restraining order.) If you have not read his books, do yourself a favor and read them immediately. We once described them to a friend as porn for English majors.
June 25th, 2007 at 6:29 am
I am so excited about the release of First among Sequels.
Porn for English majors is so true.
June 25th, 2007 at 2:10 pm
I’m also really looking forward to getting hold of this. I miss Thursday Next, even though the Nursery Crime series was good too. But nothing equals Thursday and her world.
Porn for English majors is a fantastic definition. I’m always at a loss as to how to describe Fforde. But I know now!
June 25th, 2007 at 2:37 pm
I thought that the last book ended off so well I wasn’t looking for a sequel, but this does look quite tasty
June 25th, 2007 at 8:44 pm
I’ve started the countdown for this book. Jasper Fforde is such a brilliant writer…As soon as I had read about Pride & Prejudice being involved with First Among Sequels I did a little hurray dance. I can’t wait!!
June 26th, 2007 at 11:49 pm
I’ve been looking forward to the next Thursday Next book for a while! And now that I know that Pride and Prejudice is involved, I’m even more excited! That and Sherlock Holmes (two of my favorites!) is going to make this one heck of a book!
Dead-on description of Fforde’s books — I (an English major) couldn’t have said it better myself!
June 29th, 2007 at 11:43 am
I just discovered Fforde in March. I was searching for some good sci-fi and found him thrown carelessly on the shelf near Philip K. Dick. I was hooked on The Eyre Affair before I finished reading the back cover. I read the first four books in three months time and I can’t wait for the fifth.
As a fellow English major, Rebecca, I agree, couldn’t have said it better myself!