The Fourth Bear A Nursery Crime

The inimitable Jasper Fforde gives readers another delightful mash-up of detective fiction and nursery rhyme, returning to those mean streets where no character is innocent. The Gingerbreadman—sadist, psychopath, cookie—is on the loose in Reading, but that’s not who Detective Jack Spratt and Sergeant Mary Mary are after. Instead, they’ve been demoted to searching for missing journalist Goldy” Hatchett. The last witnesses to see her alive were the reclusive Three Bears, and right away Spratt senses something furry—uh, funny—about their story, starting with the porridge. The Fourth Bearis a delirious new romp from our most irrepressible fabulist.

Jasper Fforde is the author of the bestselling Thursday Next series: The Eyre Affair, Lost in a Good Book, The Well of Lost Plots and Something Rotten. He has written one previous Nursery Crimes novel, The Big Over Easy, a New York Times extended bestseller.