DCI Thomas Nightingale

Tell me the story about the jazz vampires is something to save for another day. Instead he goes right to answering Nightingale's questions, counting them off on his fingers. "As I understand it, infractions are narrative in nature -- divergences from, and inconsistencies with, the original plot. The kind that might be produced, for example, by the villain of Hamlet absconding after the inciting incident of the play. She doesn't know why we're here, but she does know of a crime where characters were abducted from their books and placed inside another. She suspected the mansion was a book at first, because of how orderly it is, without visible imperfections. I don't know whether she's a part of it -- she claimed to be as trapped here as we are, with one or two potential routes of escape she needs to investigate further. I asked her to involve Tress, because Tress wants to escape, and ... can I be honest with you, Nightingale?" It's more of a nervous tic than a sincere question, so he continues. "Whether we're from books or worlds or other histories of the same world, I do not wish to return to where I came from. I hoped to to travel to other worlds and histories, which now I'm discovering may be a literary crime."