44. The Big Over Easy by Jasper Fforde. Hilarious "Nursery Crime" tale of the investigation into the murder of Humpty Dumpty (Humperdinck Jehoshaphat Aloysius Stuyvesant van Dumpty).
"Ovoid D-class nursery celebrity Humpty Dumpty, minor baronet, lover of women, ex-convict, and former millionaire philanthropist, is found shattered to death beneath a wall in a shabby area of town. Yes, the big egg is down."
You have to read Fforde to appreciate him - jokes and literary allusions and literary allusion jokes on every page.
For example, introducing the character of Detective Inspector Jack Spratt, who is speaking at a press conference:
"This afternoon the Reading Central Criminal Court found the three pigs not guilty of all charges relating to the first-degree murder of Mr. Wolff...Since the death by scalding of Mr. Wolff following his ill-fated climb down Little Pig C's chimney, we at the Nursery Crime Division have been following inquiries that this was
not an act of self-defense but a violent and premeditated murder by three individuals who, far from being the innocent victims of wolf-porcine crime, actually sought confrontation and then acted quite beyond what might be described as reasonable self-defense."
(some questions from the assembled reporters)
"We believed," Jack said, "that boiling Mr. Wolff alive was quite outside the realm of 'reasonable force' and the fact that the large pan of water would have taken at least six hours to reach boiling point strongly indicated premeditation."
And that's just the beginning!
