Is "The Big Over Easy" anything like "The Hollow Chocolate Bunnies of the Apocalypse" by Robert Rankin? I'd definitely recommend that btw. I'm going to have to read some Jasper Fforde now - just seen him on BBC News! :)

Where was he on BBC news? It is a bit like that... but I personally didn't like Hollow Chocolate Bunnies, and I love BOE.

For my money Jasper Fforde is far better than Rankin. I once tryed to read the chocolate bunnies and just got bored and gave up. The Big over easy had me savouring every word.

Sorry to drag this thread back to the limelight, but as both a new bod to the fforum and a staunch supporter of Mr Rankins I felt I had to stick my 'five pennithworth' in here. There arn't very many writers about like Mr Fforde but there is undoubtedly a similar vein of marvellously imaginative silliness running through the works of both these geniuses and to pooh-pooh one would be well, quite simply, to miss out..... I'll grant you HCB is not, for my money, one of Mr R's best, but try any of the seven books in the Brentford Trilogy or my favourite, Snuff Fiction. After all it's along wait until the next JF book, we've got to fill our time with something...!!

ClaireC wrote:

"...marvellously imaginative silliness..."


I've been looking for another of Mr Rankin's books without success so far, but just wanted to add that Malcolm Pryce's books (3 so far) about Private Eye Louie Knight, based in a version of Aberystwyth I've certainly not seen when I've visited, definitely comes under this banner too :-)

Very well put ClaireC!

I think HCB is a better book than TBOE in terms of imagination, humor, and the recreation of a truly scary/funny world, but I liked "Big" after page 200. Anyway, I've been wondering for some time (before Fford's version of the Dumpty case even came out) whether Rankin has some grounds for copywright infringement. Any opinions? (BTW, from a posting above, clearly Rankin has been discussed before. Excuse any repetition--this is my first visit to the Forum.)

I wouldn;t think so. The idea of humpty dumpty being killed isn;t a new one, and it;s not as if the worlds are the same. I read both books, and while I enjoyed HCB better than BOE, they were only similar in the fact that Humpty had been killed. He didn;t even die the same way in both books.

I thought that HCB was very cleverly written and I found TBOE easier to read but I think both are brilliant masterpieces.

I finished HCB a couple weeks ago, and when the Humpty Dumpty bit came up, I was thinking about TBOE. I enjoyed both, and they were both very silly and fun. TBOE seemed more complex to me; there was more that a reader could figure out along the way (if he/she/shim tried), whereas in HCB I just kind of had to read it. I loved how Rankin kept saying, "It is a fact, well known to those who know it well...." Both were a lot of fun.

I think tboa rules over hcb because the witty imaginative feel of it is better and the ideas are amazing fforde is a briliant writer i cant wait for tfb.

I never really liked HCBOTA very much, prefer his Brentford novels, oddly though I love the audio version! The Toyminater is excellent.

Can't stand the Brighton one though



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/21/2006 12:45PM by Taliesin.