  Last night I went to a book signing at a local bookstore. Jasper Fforde, author of the much-loved Thursday Next novels, is currently on tour in the States. A very large crowd gathered in the hot basement of the Brookline Booksmith and were waiting excitedly for Fforde last night at 7pm. Fforde was introduced to a big applause and "took the stage. " Interestingly enough, prior to his career in writing, Fforde had a career in film.
He began his discussion with some news and some jokes (Fforde is a very funny man). Then he talked about his new novel, Something Rotten . He spoke much of Hamlet, one of the characters in his new book and, as we all know, a timeless whiner. He described Hamlet as prone to "spontaneously soliloquizing" and tickled us pink by reading Shakespeare's/Hamlet's infamous lines backwards--"Be to not or be to" (they still equate to the same thing). The piece he chose to read was a comical scene involving our favorite Dane and a minor dispute of identity. After the talk, it was upstairs for the signing. The woman in front of me wore a long swaying dress of green that brightly framed her backfull of tattoo. She also wore a very large hat that had me worried for the books on the shelves around us, not to mention my vision (I've had people poke me in the eye with stranger things).
When she moved to the table where Fforde was happily signing away, she revealing the meaning of the mass of fur tucked beneath her arm. It was a stuffed Dodo which she proudly displayed to a mildly amused Fforde. (You see, in Fforde's novels, Dodos are the genetically reengineered pet of choice. ) After the hat woman left, I moved up the queue and said rather embarassed, "I'm afraid I left my Dodo at home. " Luckily for me, Jasper decided to sign my book anyway. 
