Caversham Heights
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| Thanks to Sixtant |
Author: Not known
Publisher: Unpublished
Source book: The Well of Lost Plots by Jasper Fforde
Set in Reading, in the South of England, this unpublished book serves as a refuge for Thursday Next when all the world: Goliath, SpecOps and Aornis Hades, seems out to get her.
Caversham Heights features a young woman called Mary Jones who lives in a decrepit Sunderland flying boat moored on a lake. Mary is converting the aircraft into a house boat. This seems quite an interesting detail in a book described as routine detective thriller with a stereotypical detective (Jack Spratt). The plot, such as it is, revolves around a drugs czar trying to muscle in on Reading’s seedy underworld. [Hmmnn… no wonder this book was never published. Although, the flying boat detail is intriguing.]
Jack Spratt is very anxious that Caversham Heights may be broken up into individual words so Thursday (who has taken over Mary’s role in the book, and is living in the plane) advises him to take steps to make it a more interesting read. Mary is Jack’s subordinate officer so she sees him quite often, and so does Thursday. She advises him to develop some different character traits.
Unfortunately, Mary’s descriptions of her DIY in the book are really quite exaggerated. She hasn’t achieved much and the plane needs a lot of work to make it comfortable. Mary shares the flying boat with two generic characters - indeterminate sex, no skills, no conversation - so Thursday has to too. She encourages them to develop names and personalities, and finds a copy of Mrs Beeton so they can learn to cook. And there’s a handy textbook called Personalities for Beginners. One of the ‘flat mates’ becomes Lola, an enthusiastic young woman, full of fun and flirtiness. She’s such a success as a character she is offered a leading role in Girls Make all the Moves; a thirty-something romantic comedy novel. The other generic ‘flat mate’ becomes Randolph, a middle aged man who paints model soldiers.
In a complicated plot twist (sometimes there is so much plot flying about it’s hard to keep up) Caversham Heights becomes a refuge for fictional characters in need of respite, and changes it’s name to Nursery Crime.
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| Thanks to Wikipedia |
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