Book Review: Something Rotten by Jasper Fforde

I've finally started back on the Thursday Next series. I'd avoided it for a while, mainly because I didn't want the series to end. (I'm still a little sad about the end of Harry Potter, which will happen in a few months when the final installment of the films is released.) So far, though, there hasn't been a definitive announcement of the end of the series. Due to Fforde's other projects, they're being published with longer periods of time in between, but I can handle that. What I'm really looking forward to now is the next installment in the Shades of Grey series, which should be out in 2012 or 2013.

Anyway. Something Rotten. It's the fourth installment of the Thursday Next series, and picks up about two years after The Well of Lost Plots ended. Thursday, tired of living in the Bookworld, returns to the real world with her two-year-old son, Friday, and must confront a number of difficulties related to her husband's ongoing eradication and her two-plus year absence from Swindon in addition to new problems in the form of Hamlet (yes, that Hamlet) coming for a visit and the return of Yorrick Kaine, the fictional villain Thursday vanquished in The Well of Lost Plots. On top of that is the matter of procuring reliable childcare for Friday and fending off yet another world-domination scheme of the Goliath Corporation.

Overall, I quite enjoyed this installment. The Thursday Next series continues to be highly amusing as well as intelligent, and the development of the characters and Thursday's world is excellent. 4 out of 5 stars.