Visit with Jasper Fforde, October 2012

Jasper Fforde meets Printz Club (from left to right): Heather, Ellen, Lindsey (me), Danny, and Karen.

Several of our Printz Club members received the opportunity to meet privately with Jasper Fforde before a book signing at Quail Ridge Books and Music on October 22, 2012.  Right before his public speaking event, he met with club members to answer questions about writing, his books, and some of his inspirations.  For this year, Fforde is the author of The Last Dragonslayer, one of the books in consideration for the Mock Printz Award. 

He explained that he tried to take all the things in common consciousness regarding dragons and do the total opposite.  Rather than make his protagonist a sorcerer, Jennifer Strange is a federal agent investigating the slow eradication of dragons from society.

Fforde was warm and engaging with our readers and made sure he interacted with each person in the room.  Afterwards, we heard him speak to a mixed-age audience.  He shared in more detail some of the inspiration for his books.

One of the best compliments you could possibly give an author after hearing them speak is to decide to pick up one of their books when you weren’t a reader before.  I was inspired to pick up some of his Nursery Crime series after hearing his musings in regards to The Fourth Bear.  To paraphrase, why were Mama Bear and Papa Bear sleeping in two different beds?  And how could the porridge be three different temperatures at the same time?  Was there a factor, a fourth bear, perhaps that isn’t mentioned?  So far the, the books is a humorous as expected.