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The Fourth Bear (Nursery Crime Adventures 2)
 
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The Fourth Bear (Nursery Crime Adventures 2) (Paperback)

by Jasper Fforde (Author)
4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
RRP: £7.99
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Frequently Bought Together

The Fourth Bear (Nursery Crime Adventures 2) + The Big Over Easy (Nursery Crime Adventures 1) + First Among Sequels
Price For All Three: £16.95

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Product details

  • Paperback: 400 pages
  • Publisher: Hodder Paperbacks (28 Jun 2007)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0340835737
  • ISBN-13: 978-0340835739
  • Product Dimensions: 19.6 x 12.4 x 2.6 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 10,994 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Product Description

Review

'What makes Fforde a star is not his ebullient cleverness, but the elusive sympathy factor. However ridiculous his themes seem, his characters have a compelling immediacy.'

(Independent )

'It would be hard not to be won over by Fforde's undeniable energy and the sheer, unrelenting number of gags'

(Daily Mail )

'Fforde is inventive and hugely funny.'

(The Times )

'THE FOURTH BEAR is a great choice as it has everything - humour, intrigue and cucumbers as a matter of national security . . . will have you wondering how you haven't discovered Fforde before.'

(Anys Scoular, Observer )

'THE FOURTH BEAR sees one of our funniest and most inventive authors at the height of his powers. The jokes come so fast that it is clear the author simply let his imagination off the leash and had a great time while writing it. You will have a great time reading it too.'

(Daily Express )

'With its witty literary allusions, social satire and blurred boundaries between fiction and reality, it's all completely mad, very funny . . . It also adds to Fforde's growing reputation as one of Britain's most inventive novelists and the thriller element keeps you guessing too.'

(Word )

Praise for Jasper Fforde's new crime series (: )

'I love it. THE BIG OVER EASY is great not just because it's very funny...but also because it works properly as a whodunit...Comic genius.' (Observer )

'A riot of puns, in-jokes and literary allusions that Fforde carries off with aplomb' (Daily Mail )

'This is the first of best-selling Fforde's hilarious, absurd and utterly compelling new series of nursery crimes for adults.'

(Daily Mirror )

'Fforde's dexterously tailored nonsense has an underlying thread of shrewd satire, and the author's own wry, dry narration helps to compensate for the omission in this abridgement of so many of his gloriously surreal jokes.'

(The Times )

'This novel is a wonderful combination of silliness and cleverness, and a delightful holiday from reality. It's got such a good comic premise that it would work even if played straight, but virtually every page is adorned with puns, gags, tongue-twisters or comic setpieces, keeping the reader in a perpetual state of amusement.'

(Independent on Sunday )


Product Description

The Gingerbreadman - psychopath, sadist, convicted murderer and cake/biscuit - is loose on the streets of Reading.

It isn't Jack Spratt's case. Despite the success of the Humpty Dumpty investigation, the well publicised failure to prevent Red Riding-Hood and her Gran being eaten once again plunges the Nursery Crime Division into controversy. Enforced non-involvement with the Gingerbreadman hunt looks to be frustrating until a chance encounter at the oddly familiar Deja-Vu Club leads them onto the hunt for missing journalist Henrietta 'Goldy' Hatchett, star reporter for The Daily Toad.

The last witnesses to see her alive were The Three Bears, comfortably living out a life of rural solitude in Andersen's wood. But all is not what it seems. Are the unexplained explosions around the globe somehow related to missing nuclear scientist Angus McGuffin? Is cucumber-growing really that dangerous? Why are National Security involved? But most important of all: How could the bears' porridge be at such disparate temperatures when they were poured at the same time? (20050619)

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What Do Customers Ultimately Buy After Viewing This Item?

The Fourth Bear (Nursery Crime Adventures 2)
79% buy the item featured on this page:
The Fourth Bear (Nursery Crime Adventures 2) 4.3 out of 5 stars (11)
£5.99
First Among Sequels
6% buy
First Among Sequels 4.3 out of 5 stars (22)
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The Big Over Easy (Nursery Crime Adventures 1)
5% buy
The Big Over Easy (Nursery Crime Adventures 1) 4.0 out of 5 stars (40)
£5.98
Something Rotten
5% buy
Something Rotten 4.7 out of 5 stars (19)
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Customer Reviews

11 Reviews
5 star:
 (5)
4 star:
 (4)
3 star:
 (2)
2 star:    (0)
1 star:    (0)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
4.3 out of 5 stars (11 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Simply fantastic, 18 Nov 2007
By S. Lewry (London, UK) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
It's quite simple: Jasper Fforde knows how to write well. That's it. All the quirky elements to his universe are secondary to his engaging and etertaining style. The fact that the universe measures up is a bonus.

I cannot wait for more from the NCD. The stories are so well crafted that it must be difficult to keep the standard high, but so far in this series, and the Thursday Next series, Fforde has not disappointed.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Another Great Book From The World of the NCD., 19 Oct 2007
By Matt (England) - See all my reviews
  
Following on seamlessly from A Big Over Easy (the first book in the NCD series), The Fourth Bear picks up the story again only a few weeks later. The NCD shone in the brief glory of the Humpty Dumpty case before suffering unfavourable press after the debacle that was the three little pigs murder charge fiasco.

The story starts with the escape of the psycopathic Gingerbreadman from St Cerabellums, a woefully inadequate mental hospital where he has been held for the last twenty years. At the same time, Jack Spratt and Mary Mary start to investigate the disappearance of Goldilocks and how cucumbers tie into the whole story.

Jack also is having trouble at home with Punch and Judy move in next door and his daughter about to marry the Titan Prometheus.

If you enjoyed The Big Over Easy then you shouldn't hesitate in buying this book as well, it's as silly and as funny and just as entertaining. A definite good read!
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Nursery madness, 4 Mar 2009
A huge fan of Jasper FForde and I think I might be in the minority but I actually prefer the nursery crimes series to Thursday Next. Not sure how far he will go with this series though.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Solid Goldilocks
Jasper Fforde's ingenious "Thursday Next series is showing some signs of running out of steam: the pseudoscience of hopping into fictional universes can eventually pall. Read more
Published 6 months ago by J. J. O'neill

5.0 out of 5 stars A Fantastic Fantasy
If you allow your credibility to be suspended, you will find this a hugely pleasurable and fantastic romp through a familiar world unfamiliarly co-populated by nursery-tale... Read more
Published 8 months ago by D S Allen

3.0 out of 5 stars not quite to form
Way better than First Among Sequels which was a disappointment. But still not quite up to scratch. I was not sure if the dialogue was tongue in cheek or just plain clunky at... Read more
Published 12 months ago by Mr. H. Jones

5.0 out of 5 stars Fantastic! Read them all!!!
Brilliant! Brilliant! Brilliant! Just about the best writer alive. So funny, so clever and he can get away with anything absurd. Read more
Published 15 months ago by PetShopChap

5.0 out of 5 stars On the up!
When I read the first Nursery Crimes novel, The Big Over Easy, I was sorely disappointed. It was good, but the special spark that the Thursday Next novels had was just not there... Read more
Published 18 months ago by Jonathan

4.0 out of 5 stars Original
This is the first book I have read by this author following a recommendation and I didn't really know what to expect. Read more
Published on 1 Nov 2007 by Mrs. S. Payne

4.0 out of 5 stars A Good Detective Novel lies within
What many people seem to miss is that, below the bad puns, literary jokes and nursery rhyme nonsense lurks a good detective story with real characters. Read more
Published on 26 Oct 2007 by Humphrey Plugg

3.0 out of 5 stars Fun and Quirky
Having followed Fforde through his writing career with the adventures of Tuesday Next I was curious to see what the Nursery Crimes Division books were like. Read more
Published on 11 Oct 2007 by Mrs. K. A. Wheatley

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