The Big Over Easy (Jasper Fforde) - Penguin Books - 2005 - 386 pages
Detective Inspector Jack Spratt works for the Reading Police Department in the Nursery Crime Division. Humperdinck Aloysius Dumpty is found dead near a wall. It looks like an open and shut case but maybe not. As in his Thursday Next series, author Fforde uses numerous literary references to tie together a very entertaining story in an alternate timeline. Do not try to read this one to your 5-year-old child unless you are prepared to answer a multitude of questions. I did not see how the author could turn this well-known nursery rhyme into a 400-page detective story but he did it. I like the way his mind works. [JAM 6/9/2012]