Straining Credulity: Jasper Fforde at Nottingham Central Library

About

Nottingham Central Library are excited to host Jasper Fforde this year, in conversation with Hannah Trevarthan from Nottingham City of Literature, where Jasper will be talking all things tips, tricks and insights into his journey becoming a published author, revelling in the unexpected twists and turns that come along with such a profession. We will be discussing best sellers such as The Eyre Affair and his upcoming release Dark Reading Matter.

About Jasper Fforde:

Jasper Fforde spent twenty years in the film business before debuting on the New York Time Bestseller list with The Eyre Affair in 2001. His 18th novel, Dark Reading Matter, will be published in the UK/USA in October 2026.

Fforde's writing is an eclectic mix of genres, which might be described as a joyful blend of Comedy-SF-thriller-Crime-Satire. He freely admits that he is fascinated not just by books themselves, but by the way we read and what we read, and his reinvigoration of tired genres have won him many enthusiastic supporters across the world.

There will be an opportunity to purchase books from Five Leaves Bookshop and a signing after the talk.

Amongst Fforde's output are police procedurals featuring nursery rhyme characters; a four-book series for Young Adults about Magic and Dragons set in a shabby world of failing magical powers, Shades of Grey (2011) a post-apocalyptic dystopia where social hierarchy is based on the colours you can see, Early Riser (2018), a thriller set in a world in which humans have always hibernated, and The Constant Rabbit (2020), an allegory about racism and xenophobia in the UK.

Fforde was born in England but has recently decided to adopt the nationality of where he lives when he heard that: 'When you truly love Wales, you are Welsh'.