A Fantastic Exploration of the Written Word

One of my favorite series when I was in high school were the Thursday Next novels by Jasper Fforde which followed the protagonist as she literally (ha!) traveled through books. Thursday Next lives in a parallel universe with cops that police not only the here and now but also throughout time and books as well. Next is a Literary SpecOps (Special Operations) agent in her world but also works to combat rogues in books as well with Jursifiction. Fforde's novels are fun intertextual adventures playing with many layers of books and the written word. For example, Next's first mission with Jurisfiction involves replacing a canine protagonist who has gone blind with a new one but is almost killed by the "generics" (characters in a story who aren't developed by the author) who get high off emotions. I would definitely recommend the Thursday Next series as an entertaining look at the literary world, readers, and what goes on in the books we are reading.