Actually listening. I just finished (finally) an audiobook I was listening to on the drive to Chicago and back — ONE OF OUR THURSDAYS IS MISSING by Fford.
I have to mention this, because it may be the cleverest book I ever read and I hereby declare you all must go read it.
The main character is the “written Thursday”, who is the protagonist in the books about the “real Thursday” (who was introduced in Fford’s first book, THE EYRE AFFAIR, which involves somebody kidnapping Jane Eyre from her book and holding her hostage, in an alternate world where people take their literature VERY seriously. Did you follow all that?)
So, the written Thursday lives, obviously, in the Book World, which contains all the settings and characters ever written. I just don’t know how to describe the Book World. I mean, there are islands for speculative fiction and racy novels and so on, in a sea of phonemes.
There’s quite a bit of interplay between the real world and the Book World. The real Thursday vanished when visiting the Book World, and now the written Thursday is trying to track her down while all kinds of things complicate matters.
At one point the written Thursday visits the real world, and that part may have some of my favorite touches, as for example Thursday is so amazed by visual detail because in the book world only important things are clearly seen, with washes of indistinct magenta between.
Just all kinds of extremely clever details, far too many to even begin to mention, plus this beautiful touch right at the end where we finally find out where the real Thursday is (it makes so much sense! And is so funny!).
So, anyway, if you see a copy sitting around, grab it! You totally do not need to read the earlier ones in the series, go right ahead and start with this one, it stands alone perfectly.
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