When Jasper Fforde set his best-selling Thursday Next series in the borough of Swindon, England, little did he know that it would put both the sleepy town and his characters on the map.
The books, which blend sci-fi with literary fiction, place Swindon at the centre of a vast government conspiracy in a surreal and futuristic alternate universe. The local council saw the joke. And, perhaps sensing a golden opportunity to shake their public image as the home of a Honda manufacturing plant, appointed Fforde as temporary mayor and named five new streets after his characters.
It worked a treat. Swindon is now also known as home of Fforde Fiestas, well-attended conventions organised by Fforde's most ardent readers. Self-described 'ffans' of the famously punny novelist descend on the city for weekends of re-enactments, fancy dress banquets and guided tours. It speaks to the fact that cult novelists have pulling power of which literary giants can only dream, but Fforde seems a touch bemused by the devotion.
'Often I'll pit myself against attendees in trivia contests about my books. I always lose,' he says, before adding with faint sheepishness, 'The questions can be incredibly obscure ... There's a lot going on in my books, y'know.'
No one can doubt that. The depth of Fforde's fandom owes much to his ability to construct intricately detailed and absurd alternate realities that counterpoint our own.
His Thursday Next books are set in a Britain where the Crimean war still rages, time travel is possible and people can step in and out of literature. Thursday, the main character, is a middle-aged mother and literary detective assigned the task of policing the border between works of literature and the real world, across which enterprising villains frequently try to drag popular characters and hold them to ransom. Twists and clever literary allusions come thick and fast, and the books incorporate characters from classic literature such as Jane Eyre, Hamlet and Miss Havisham from Great Expectations.
