This opens almost immediately after the events of The Song of the Quarkbeast. Jennifer and the wizards of Kazam must recapture the Tralfamosaur that they accidentally released at the end of the previous book.
This leads to a diplomatic incident with the Cambrian Empire. If that's not bad enough, the Mighty Shandar is more than a little peeved with Jennifer. Because she saved the dragons in the first book, he has now failed in his contract to destroy them all and a refund has been demanded.
The Mighty Shandar does not give refunds.
Jennifer must now go on a quest through the Cambrian Empire to find the mythical Leviathan's Graveyard to retrieve the even more mythical Eye of Zoltar- a cursed Ruby of immense magical power.
Despite being a YA book, the plotting is getting increasingly convoluted. That's a good thing by the way.
This latest entry in the series is hysterically funny in places and strangely moving in others. I will admit to working out where the jewel was about 100 pages before the characters did, but this is a YA book so that's probably not that much of an achievement.
The ending is a great set up for the next book, and a demonstration of how to do a cliffhanger ending. Fforde is building up to the ending from at least halfway through if not earlier, and still remembers to finish the central plot of this book (which is the central flaw in the AM Shine novel I read recently. He just finished on a cliffhanger with zero resolution to any plot points).
If you want to read this, you will need to read the first two first. These are not standalone novels and would be incredibly confusing if you weren't acquainted with the world Fforde has built.
I have book 4 at home ready and waiting. It has moved several spots up my TBR and leapfrogged over all his other books that I have yet to read.
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