The Eyre Affair

Overall this was a pleasant book, but I shy away from putting it at the same level as an Asimov mystery novel. This is a 2,5 stars. If I read through the end, I kind of liked it.

This is probably a book for those who love English literature, Shakespeare, Keats and others. The authors creates an alternative reality where books really matter, so much that there is a very active Spec-ops crime division, where our heroin Thursday Next works.

Some of the occurrences that are somewhat common in this world:

- literary forgeries, where books are slightly, but significantly rewritten to better suit the forger views of how the story should really have happened. They sometimes go through great lengths, even writing original manuscripts, signing it as a famous author. Only a very trained Literary Tech can spot the differences between the real thing.

- close to religion fights among different literary legends followers, such as Baconians and Shakesperians. Jehovah witness? Try some people going door to door, spreading over developed theories of how it wasn't Shakespeare that wrote any of his plays!

- Time traveling is somewhat common, even though heavily policed.

The plot is slowly developed along the book. The real plot only starts somewhat by the end of it. The villain appears at the start of the book, and then at the end again. He has some super human powers that are never explained, and our heroin is the only one that can resist them for whatever reason.

There are are many subplots that are nowhere connected. There is a 100+ years war going on between England and Russia going on. There is a whole chapter of a fight with a vampire. Yes, it did have an impact latter on, but it didn't play well for me. It added color to the story, but added to the lack of cohesion of the book.

I liked the villain. He is described as being pure evil, he delights himself in wickedness. He actually wrote the book “Degeneracy for Fun and Profit”. He is a mastermind criminal and he has superhuman powers (close to immortal, ageless, super strength). Because of that, I would expect a better end for him.

The book has a very standard happy ending, which did not sit well with me. I like unusual things, and the plot gave ample leeway for for that.

But again, for those who love English literature, who have read and liked Jaine Eyre, it must have had an special feeling to wonder how it would fell like to interact with the characters, to change the story, to fear for the integrity of its plot, for its very existence!