Hardcover, 407 pages
English language
Published Aug. 2, 2018 by Viking.
Every Winter, the human population hibernates.
During those bitterly cold four months, the nation is a snow-draped landscape of desolate loneliness, and devoid of human activity.
Well, not quite.
Your name is Charlie Worthing and it's your first season with the Winter Consuls, the committed but mildly unhinged group of misfits who are responsible for ensuring the hibernatory safe passage of the sleeping masses.
You are investigating an outbreak of viral dreams which you dismiss as nonsense; nothing more than a quirky artefact borne of the sleeping mind.
When the dreams start to kill people, it's unsettling.
When you get the dreams too, it's weird.
When they start to come true, you begin to doubt your sanity.
But teasing truth from Winter is never easy: You have to avoid the Villains and their penchant for murder, kidnapping and stamp collecting, ensure you aren't eaten by Nightwalkers whose thirst for human …
Every Winter, the human population hibernates.
During those bitterly cold four months, the nation is a snow-draped landscape of desolate loneliness, and devoid of human activity.
Well, not quite.
Your name is Charlie Worthing and it's your first season with the Winter Consuls, the committed but mildly unhinged group of misfits who are responsible for ensuring the hibernatory safe passage of the sleeping masses.
You are investigating an outbreak of viral dreams which you dismiss as nonsense; nothing more than a quirky artefact borne of the sleeping mind.
When the dreams start to kill people, it's unsettling.
When you get the dreams too, it's weird.
When they start to come true, you begin to doubt your sanity.
But teasing truth from Winter is never easy: You have to avoid the Villains and their penchant for murder, kidnapping and stamp collecting, ensure you aren't eaten by Nightwalkers whose thirst for human flesh can only be satisfied by comfort food, and sidestep the increasingly less-than-mythical WinterVolk.
But so long as you remember to wrap up warmly, you'll be fine.
All of Jasper Fforde's books are weird on some level but this was the weirdest by far and I can't say I enjoyed it. I finished it because I wanted to see how it would end but I don't feel better for sticking with it.
This was a truly captivating and unique book that really has no comparison. It is a perfect mixture of whimsy and grisly bluntness that I found really charming most of the time. The world and the story is fascinating, and when it gets going, kept me engrossed. But the PACING! Never before have I considered that perhaps there's TOO much world building in a book. The sheer amount of jargon that is thrown at you, that's then subsequently explained (or worse, not explained at all, only to be gleaned from context 50 pages later) made this an extremely slow read. I was 3/4th the way into the book before I actually felt like the story moved beyond the introduction into the actual content. The final 80 pages or so are real page turners, after all of the excessive information has been saturated enough that you can understand what's going on. …
This was a truly captivating and unique book that really has no comparison. It is a perfect mixture of whimsy and grisly bluntness that I found really charming most of the time. The world and the story is fascinating, and when it gets going, kept me engrossed. But the PACING! Never before have I considered that perhaps there's TOO much world building in a book. The sheer amount of jargon that is thrown at you, that's then subsequently explained (or worse, not explained at all, only to be gleaned from context 50 pages later) made this an extremely slow read. I was 3/4th the way into the book before I actually felt like the story moved beyond the introduction into the actual content. The final 80 pages or so are real page turners, after all of the excessive information has been saturated enough that you can understand what's going on. But the majority of the book is honestly quite the slog. I'd recommend this book if you have a lot of time on your hands and you like the Welsh.
It starts off pretty slowly but good god does it get incredible. Loved the psychological elements. Finally got me back into reading after a many year long hiatus. The ending wasn't quite as I'd hoped it to be but it was still a fine conclusion to a great story.
It's a post-apoc story, but it has enough lightheartedness to it that I could read it during the pandemic
Where to begin? Early Riser is part science fiction, part mystery, definitely parody and all fun! Jasper Fforde always creates different realities for his stories and this time, he's outdone himself.
This is a world in which people survive a dangerous winter by bulking up, then hibernating. Sleep, perchance to dream--no, no, that's no good: dreams supposedly waste too much energy, too many calories. To increase the chances of surviving the winter, people take an expensive drug called morphenox, designed by a greedy corporation called HiberTech. Those who can afford or gain access to it, that is. And it may cause side effects, such as becoming a nightwalker, or one who never really wakes up (Nightwalkers are scary when they're hungry).
The protagonist of this zany novel is Charles Worthing, who has decided to join the Winter Consul to gain access to morphinox. It's a dangerous job that involves staying …
Where to begin? Early Riser is part science fiction, part mystery, definitely parody and all fun! Jasper Fforde always creates different realities for his stories and this time, he's outdone himself.
This is a world in which people survive a dangerous winter by bulking up, then hibernating. Sleep, perchance to dream--no, no, that's no good: dreams supposedly waste too much energy, too many calories. To increase the chances of surviving the winter, people take an expensive drug called morphenox, designed by a greedy corporation called HiberTech. Those who can afford or gain access to it, that is. And it may cause side effects, such as becoming a nightwalker, or one who never really wakes up (Nightwalkers are scary when they're hungry).
The protagonist of this zany novel is Charles Worthing, who has decided to join the Winter Consul to gain access to morphinox. It's a dangerous job that involves staying up during the winter to protect the general population against crimes. Cannibalistic nightwalkers, villians (some of them scary philatelists), and Wintervolk, oh my!
Basically, that is the world which forms the backdrop for this story. No spoilers, then-- go with it! It's a fun ride with lots of little twists and turns and won't get dull.
Worthy.
A cumbersome beginning, with a few stumbles along the way; and the interactions between characters is curiously affectless; and you’re going to need a heaping dose of Extra-Strength Disbelief-Suspensio™ because the rules of this new world aren’t even internally consistent. But I found myself not caring: the story was good, the characters interesting in themselves. A tad heavyhanded near the end (in ways that were predictable from the first few chapters), but oh god much less so than that stupid rabbit book we won’t mention. Fun plot twists, some predictable but most not: overall, it just kept getting weirder as it progressed, weirder in quirky and engaging ways. It must be interesting to have an imagination like Fforde’s, and obviously not all of it works for everyone (cough rabbit book *cough), but this one worked for me. Fforde writes with compassion and grace, and I promise you that …
Worthy.
A cumbersome beginning, with a few stumbles along the way; and the interactions between characters is curiously affectless; and you’re going to need a heaping dose of Extra-Strength Disbelief-Suspensio™ because the rules of this new world aren’t even internally consistent. But I found myself not caring: the story was good, the characters interesting in themselves. A tad heavyhanded near the end (in ways that were predictable from the first few chapters), but oh god much less so than that stupid rabbit book we won’t mention. Fun plot twists, some predictable but most not: overall, it just kept getting weirder as it progressed, weirder in quirky and engaging ways. It must be interesting to have an imagination like Fforde’s, and obviously not all of it works for everyone (cough rabbit book *cough), but this one worked for me. Fforde writes with compassion and grace, and I promise you that this will take you to interesting and thoughtful places.
