Not THOSE Shades of Grey

Jasper Fforde is delightful.  Only he could combine nursery rhyme and storybook characters with hard-boiled crime stories to make something wonderfully readable.  Everything about them is cheeky and a nod to other literary works, characters, etc.  I mean, how awesome is a crime novel about the demise of Humpty Dumpty called The Big Over Easy?  Hahahaha!

I recently enjoyed Book One of his most recent series, Shades of Grey.  NO, not THOSE Fifty Shades of Grey.  I know, I know, they're getting a lot of press, especially among those of us Gen X and older.  But this is a futuristic novel where people are ranked in society according to how well, and how much, they see colors.  It's exploring social differences and stereotypes among people of different "colors" in society... but taking that notion to an entirely new plane.  Fun steampunkiness too.

And for the record, I'm sure I'll read Fifty Shades of Grey.  Not sure I'll blog about it, though.