I received a free copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for a possible review.

I am not even a huge fan of Dickens, but I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I really love Jasper Fforde's writing and this gave off a very Thursday Next kind of vibe. If you like the classics, especially Dickens, you may enjoy this book. Understanding where the literary references and analysis come from deepened my engagement with the story and made me think as well.

The book is mainly told from the perspective of the brother of an avid reader and Dickens expert who happens to have a special ability. Sometimes the characters he is reading come to life. As the title suggests Uriah Heep is one of those characters and integral to the plot. If you know anything about Uriah Heep that can't possibly be a good thing. If you want to know more, I suggest reading the book. I'm not going to give any more away.

The book was longer than I expected but kept a good pace. It made me want to reread Dickens which is something I never thought I would say. Certainly, it gave me a greater appreciation of Dickens.

While this is definitely a well written fantasy-adventure story especially catered to book lovers, I guess I couldn’t enjoy it completely because I’m pretty unfamiliar with many of the classics. Except my favorites like Sherlock or Darcy, I really didn’t know about any of the other characters to understand their motivations in this story, and neither am I intellectual enough to really grasp the essence of all the literary criticism interspersed throughout this novel. So while I enjoyed the overall idea of this fantasy world, and the two protagonists Rob and Charley, I never could find myself completely immersed in it.

It’s definitely a me thing, and not the issue of the book. Would recommend it for other book lovers, especially those who have read a lot of classics and appreciate them.

Have you ever wondered what it might be like if your favorite literary characters came to life? You may want to rethink that wish because it might not turn out very well at all.

Charley was born with a unique gift. He can magically summon literary characters to life. When they arrive they are imbued with the characteristics that the reader has imagined… so it can be a bit unpredictable! Rob’s older brother has struggled with his relationship with his little brother now that they are in the same city. He’s torn between feeling as though he needs to take care of Charley and wanting his little brother to be independent enough to deal with his own problems.

This book is part love-letter to literary characters and part magical mystery. There are other characters dwelling in secret in the city and it becomes clear that someone else must have the same powers as Charley. Thus begins the mystery of where the characters are coming from and what they’re up to!

I loved the relationship between Charley and Rob. The characters are well developed and Parry has definitely managed a difficult genre expertly. It’s not easy to add well-loved characters to your novel and make them unique and still true to their original! Bravo!

You don’t have to have read Dickens etc to enjoy this book, but it will probably make it a lot more of an adventure if you have!

Did you ever want to be able to have tea with one of your favorite book characters? Or visit a street in Victorian London? In The Unlikely Escape of Uriah Heep, you can do those things. Dr. Charles Sutherland is an English literature professor with an unusual skill; he can “read” characters from books into existence. While this would be a fabulous skill to have, sometimes it can lead to unexpected consequences. What if the character is a fire-breathing dragon or a pre-teen girl detective who decides she’d rather not be in the story any longer? When Charles encounters these situations, it’s up to his brother Robert to try to intervene and help him catch the escaped character.

Part fantasy, part mystery, this novel fills a lot of genres. The novel takes place in New Zealand, but really could be based anywhere. New Zealand is not a character in this story. Charles is a very unique character and concept. His ability to bring book characters to life is a fun escape for the reader. When characters suddenly appear to be doing wrong, that’s when this book takes a turn for the worse and the mystery and suspense begins. Charles and Robert find themselves in a battle for good and evil from the pages of a book.

I loved this book. The concept was so unique and fun to imagine. Robert is the perfect older brother who is exasperated with his younger brother. Charles is an enigma. Parry brings forth both classic English fictional characters and characters of her own making. The world created is exactly what one would expect from the classic literature referenced. Sherlock Holmes, Dorian Gray and Heathcliff are all exactly what would be expected from their own authors. Clearly Parry is an expert in English lit herself.

While this novel is long, it’s a fun and entertaining ride through a fantasy world many of us would love to visit. Parry has done a wonderful job.


This review will be posted at BookwormishMe.com close to publication date.

Thank you to Netgalley for providing me with this book in exchange for my honest opinion. It will be available for purchase on July 23rd.

If you enjoy The Book Jumper, Mr. Penumbra’s 24-hour Bookstore, or even the TV show The Librarians, you’ll love this book. It celebrates the bond between a reader and a really good book. I fell in love with this book before the first chapter had even ended.

Charlie Sutherland is a prodigy. Brilliant at languages, he teaches Dickensian literature at a university. He also has the-sometimes unfortunate- tendency to read characters out of books. He can also put them back, but they don’t always want to go.

The book opens with Charlie’s older brother Rob, receiving a phone call: Charlie’s accidentally read Uriah Heep out of David Copperfield and needs help catching him so that he can be read back into his book. When Rob and Charlie finally catch him, Uriah warns that a new world is coming, brought into being by another book summoner. From there, Charlie and his less-than-enthusiastic brother are drawn into a fight for both fiction and reality.

I loved Charlie. He was a delightful combination of brilliance and naivete. He was a bit uncomfortable in his own skin unless he was discussing books. Then he had an enthusiasm and confidence that a was a ton of fun to read. He also looked up to Rob so much, and Rob couldn’t really see it.

The book is told largely from Rob’s perspective as he’s drawn into a world where fiction and reality collide. He feels largely out of his element, and he’s a little resentful of Charlie for that. He was such a complicated character, often at odds with himself, and made for a great narrator.

My other favorite character (the last one, I promise!) was Dorian Gray. He was selfish and intelligent, unsettling, and unapologetic about who he was or any choices he’d ever made. He was exactly the way he always seemed to me in Oscar Wilde’s book, and I loved every scene he was in.

The twists weren’t very twisty; I saw them all coming. It didn’t dull my enjoyment of the book at all, however. It was highly entertaining, and surprisingly thought-provoking. I’ll definitely read this again in the future.

As literary invertebrates (aka bookworms) we love books, so books about books are like having our cake and eating it too, amiright?! Enter The Unlikely Escape of Uriah Heep by H.G. Parry, a story about a man who can bring characters out of books into the real world by reading, and the effects that has on him, his family, and the city in New Zealand where they live. The story opens with the accidental summoning and unlikely escape of the infamous Dickensian villain Uriah Heep and picks up steam from there.

We see the events unfold through the first-person pov of Rob Sutherland, the older and non-magical brother of Charley, who is our summoner. Charley started reading characters out of books at the age of four, starting with The Cat in the Hat. (Can you even imagine?! How freaking awesome would that be as a kid?! Hell, even as a parent, I'll admit I'd be pretty stoked to meet the Cat! Lol) It wasn't easy, however, for Rob to be the older brother of a genius who graduated with a Ph.D from Oxford at the age of 19, who also just happens to be able to summon characters from books at inopportune times. It quickly becomes clear that Rob harbors quite a bit of resentment there but he still feels the need to try to protect Charley as much as possible while aslo complaining about it. So, (mostly) typical sibling stuff.

When Rob and Charley are attacked by the Hound of the Baskervilles they realize that not only is there another summoner out there but they likely know Charley's secret and don't exactly want to be friends. What follows is a race to discover who the other summoner is, what they want with Charley, and how to stop them before innocent people (and characters) get killed. Along the way we meet a number of other easily recognizable (classic) literary characters, including Sherlock Holmes, Mr. Darcy, The White Witch, Dr. Frankenstein, and Dorian Gray, among others.

This incredible story is a love letter to books, specifically Victorian era classics. It's a wonderfully well written fantasy, with a healthy dose of literary theory and analysis, interspersed with mystery, and laced with an examination of familial bonds and the love between brothers.

A must-read for book lovers of all flavors.

In a word: delightful!

**Thanks to Redhook/Orbit and NetGalley for the ARC! All opinions are my own.**