If you're interested in reading Jasper Fforde's The Well of Lost Plots, I'm going to assume you're already conversant with his superb The Eyre Affair, which launched the series, and the not-so-superb first sequel, Lost in a Good Book. If you haven't yet read these two books, be forewarned that reading this review may spoil a few surprises for you.

The Well of Lost Plots picks up where Lost in a Good Book left off. Thursday Next is pregnant with her eradicated husband's child and on the run from Goliath Corporation. So she does the obvious thing and quite literally flees into the world of fiction, where she is apprenticed as a Jurisdiction officer under the strict tuition of Great Expectations' Miss Havisham. Accustomed to policing literary crimes in the "Outland," Thursday is in for some surprises as she trains with the internal agency responsible for narrative continuity. She finds lodging in a very marginal, unpublished novel in the Well, a sub-basement of the massive Great Library that is the repository, birthplace and ultimate home of all the fictional works of the English Language. In her new digs, Thursday becomes conversant with how fiction is really created, and also gets an eyeful of some of the real backstories behind such works as Wuthering Heights. Jurisdiction is eagerly awaiting the release of UltraWord, a groundbreaking new format for literature that will change reading as the world knows it. But there are questions and doubts about this long awaited new code, and the plot thickens around the factions for and against UltraWord. When she's off-duty, Thursday must confront an enemy even more threatening and implacable than Goliath Corporation (which vanished her husband, Landen). The truth is that Thursday is battling the loss and manipulation of her own memories, starting with her sweetest recollections of her husband and her darkest moments from her tour of duty in the Crimea.

As with Fforde's previous works, having a decent background in English literature adds a great deal to one's pleasure in reading The Well of Lost Plots. And once again, my impression is that this sequel is inferior to the original. But I do think that The Well of Lost Plots is superior to the first sequel Lost in a Good Book. If the "clever idea parade" is still in full swing, Fforde does keep a slightly tighter rein on where he allows the plot to wander. But I'd still term this a concept book rather than a real story. At least in The Well of Lost Plots, Fforde has an entirely new world to play with and to embellish to his heart's content with his vivid and delightful imagination. This new world shares the same inspired madness that informs Thursday Next's world, which is different enough from our own to keep any reader guessing.

Fforde appears to have done all the character development he intends to do with Thursday Next in The Eyre Affair. For a pregnant woman whose husband is simply gone, Thursday experiences surprisingly few pangs of grief or longing, even if she is losing her memory. I found this disappointing. Thursday was reasonably well fleshed in the original, but I still think she could afford to show a little evolution as the series continues.

A few minor characters from the earlier books show up in The Well of Lost Plots, even if just in passing. The inevitable finally happens with Thursday's eccentric mad-inventor uncle. (I'd been waiting for it since The Eyre Affair, but just in case you haven't seen it coming, I won't spill it here.) Thursday's fascinating ancient grandmother takes a more active role in this book and serves as an excellent foil to her as she seriously begins to lose her marbles.

Fforde's writing skills and wry, intelligent humor are still very much on display. You will grin repeatedly while reading this book, but probably not laugh out loud very often. As with Lost in a Good Book, I felt that the plot and the storytelling were weaker than in the original. That's not exactly a strong criticism, because Fforde spins a yarn awfully well. It's just hard to accept that his best may already be behind him and that as a reader I may only have more watered down and inferior sequels to look forward to.

Like the first sequel, The Well of Lost Plots is obviously a link in a series. The lack of resolution to the crisis presented in the second book is beginning to wear a little thin by now. I am getting the impression that Fforde is purposely spinning this yarn in a way that he hopes will keep his readers' interest and further the suspense, but I'm not buying it. In my opinion, Fforde would do better to resolve a few of the "situations" sooner rather than later if he intends to keep milking the series for all its worth. Too many balls in the air at one time is merely distracting on the page.

I'm still hanging in there with this series, even if the two sequels to The Eyre Affair have seriously dampened my expectations down. Having checked out Fforde's entertaining website, I know that yet another book, codenamed TN4, is being constructed in the sub-basement of the Great Library. If you're already a fan of Thursday Next and haven't found this site, I recommend you skeedaddle on over to:

www.thursdaynext.com

...for a variety of retinal screen savers, free upgrades, Goliath merchandising, news of more to come from Jasper Fforde and other miscellaneous fun.


Final Thoughts

I enjoyed reading The Well of Lost Plots enough to recommend it to other readers, especially those who are already sold out Thursday Next fans. I certainly would not recommend starting with this book if you haven't read Fforde's previous works. Let's all hope that Fforde can endow TN4 with some of the magic and delight of his first work, and thereby entirely redeem the series thus far.



Want to read what I had to say about Fforde's other books? Of course you do!
• The Eyre Affair - the one book by Jasper Fforde you absolutely must read
• Lost in a Good Book - better than TWOLP, but Fforde's still suffering from sequelitis



Recommended: Yes