The Big Over Easy

Book cover of The Big Over Easy

Book description

It's Easter in Reading - a bad time for eggs - and no one can remember the last sunny day. Humpty Dumpty, well-known nursery favourite, large egg, ex-convict and former millionaire philanthropist is found shattered beneath a wall in a shabby area of town.

Following the pathologist's careful reconstruction of…

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Nursery rhyme

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Why read it?

4 authors picked The Big Over Easy as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Verlin Darrow

Author

Fforde is unimaginably imaginative. He creates an entirely new world in which nursery rhyme and fairy tale characters exist--with all the flaws that humans embody. Within that world, His detective chases a murderer via a twisting plot. Great stuff!

From Verlin's 3 favorite reads in 2024.

Dominic Hodgson

Author

Disclaimer: off the bat, this is a book I’ve read more than once before, yet I indeed read it again within this window, and it is so good, so you’re getting it here.

Love murder mysteries? Love nursery rhymes? Love creative whimsy? This book has it all, and it has remained in my literary awareness for those reasons ever since I first came across it as a teen. Fforde has a knack for new takes on classical stories and the English language itself, giving us here an engaging take on law enforcement, the media, and business as lived in by…

From Dominic's 3 favorite reads in 2023.

Jane Tesh

Author

Jasper Fforde is an author whose works defy description. Mystery, fantasy, time travel, and delightful humor are all found in his work, plus there is enough wordplay and literary references to please an English major like me. I had the opportunity to hear him speak, and he is just as entertaining as his books. My favorite is The Big Over Easy. Jack Spratt and Mary Mary of the Nursery Crime Division investigate the death of Humpty Dumpty. Did he fall or was he pushed? Add the evil Goliath Company, friendly aliens, and a rampaging Gingerbread Man, and you will…

From Jane's list on readers who have had it with dystopian angst.

The Secret Order of the Scepter & Gavel

By Nicholas Ponticello,

Book cover of The Secret Order of the Scepter & Gavel

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What is my book about?

Vanderough University prepares its graduates for life on Mars. Herbert Hoover Palminteri enrolls at VU with the hope of joining the Martian colony in 2044 as a member of its esteemed engineer corps. But then Herbert is tapped to join a notorious secret society: the Order of the Scepter and Gavel. As a new pledge, Herbert has to prove himself in a series of dangerous initiation rites, even if it means risking his life and the lives of his friends.

Many years later, when Herbert thinks the scandals of his youth are finally dead and buried, a murder occurs in…

The Secret Order of the Scepter & Gavel

By Nicholas Ponticello,

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Misha Handman

Author

I’ve always had a soft spot for Jasper Fforde’s blend of serious drama and wacky humour, and his Nursey Crimes series is one of my favourite. Set in a world in which nursery rhyme characters live alongside ordinary humans, it follows Detective-Inspector Jack Spratt and his assistant Mary Mary, as they investigate the murder of wealthy investor Humpty Dumpty, dealing with the dark underpinnings of nursery rhyme society.

From Misha's list on fantasy that draws from older stories.