History Literature / NurseryCrime

* EccentricMillionaire: Lord Randolph Spongg, the wealthy owner of Spongg footwear, who lives in a mansion inspired by German Expressionism that is absurd and almost impossible to navigate.

* {{Expy}}:
** Jack, Mary, Lord Randolph Spongg, Lola Vavoom, and Prometheus, from Jasper Fforde's Literature/ThursdayNext series.
** ''The Fourth Bear'' also features [[Literature/ThePictureOfDorianGray Dorian Gray]] as a used car dealer peddling appropriately macabre merchandise, and Caliban from [[Creator/WilliamShakespeare Shakespeare's]] ''Theatre/TheTempest'' as a pest in the Spratt household.

* CaptainErsatz: Friedland Chymes is an only-slightly-exaggerated Literature/SherlockHolmes. He has an assistant called Flotsam, and a reputation for seeing straight through hugely complex cases based on a few minor details - in one instance, he identifies the murderer based on the word he played in a TabletopGame/{{Scrabble}} game. However, it is mentioned elsewhere that Sherlock Holmes himself existed in this world. [[spoiler: Also a subversion, as Chymes is eventually revealed to be the polar opposite of Sherlock Holmes--a corrupt, selfish, incompetent, opportunistic, backstabbing fraud, who regularly steals credit from other, worthier detectives and even fakes his own investigations for the sake of popularity.]]

* EccentricMillionaire: Lord Randolph Spongg, the wealthy owner of Spongg footwear, who lives in a mansion expired by German Expressionism that is absurd and almost impossible to navigate.

* LookBehindYou: Subverted at the end: [[spoiler: Bisky-Batt was right, the Small Olymbian Bear really was behind Jack- and armed!]]

* HouseboatHero: Mary lives on a converted flying boat on a Lake, next to other fictional characters including [[Literature/TwentyThousandLeaguesUnderTheSea Captain Nemo]]

Not to be confused with the Music/{{Genesis}} album ''Music/NurseryCryme''.

* BadLiar: Due to his lack of familiarity with Earth culture, Ashley's lies are outlandish stories. One of his excuses (given in his capacity as a police officer) involves pirates, another involves the theft of elephants as an excuse to demand grocery store surveillance footage. Ashley claims that Rambosians are better liars since they have perfect memories, but it doesn't seem evident from his behavior.

* BizarreAlienBiology: The Rambosians are basically living water balloons, fluid-filled sacks who can swap bodies with a touch and store their memories in jars.

* TheyWalkAmongUs: [[FairyTales Fairy tale]] characters, Greek gods, anthropomorphic bears...

* GenreSavvy: Pretty much everyone. Members of the Guild of Detectives are not only selected based on stereotypical "detective traits" (drinking problems, vintage cars, unsteady love affairs) but are also accompanied by sidekicks who write their friends' adventures, [[SherlockHolmes Watson-style]], to appear in 1930s-style crime comics. The entire police department also seems to have learned their procedure entirely from 1970s American cop shows. In ''The Fourth Bear'', the NCD officers discuss which plot devices to use in their investigations.

* CaptainErsatz: Friedland Chymes is an only-slightly-exaggerated SherlockHolmes. He has an assistant called Flotsam, and a reputation for seeing straight through hugely complex cases based on a few minor details - in one instance, he identifies the murderer based on the word he played in a TabletopGame/{{Scrabble}} game. However, it is mentioned elsewhere that Sherlock Holmes himself existed in this world. [[spoiler: Also a subversion, as Chymes is eventually revealed to be the polar opposite of Sherlock Holmes--a corrupt, selfish, incompetent, opportunistic, backstabbing fraud, who regularly steals credit from other, worthier detectives and even fakes his own investigations for the sake of popularity.]]

* LotsaPeopleTryToDunIt: Nearly every suspect in the book actually tried to kill Humpty Dumpty, but didn't succeed. [[spoiler: His ex-wife thought she shot him, but actually killed his friend, Lord Spongg wired his car with a bomb but Humpty didn't drive it it, and Solomon Grundy hired a hit man who shot Humpty when he was already dying. The real killer? Humpty's crazy doctor who used him to incubate a monster, killing Humpty (who is literally a large egg) when it hatched.]]

* {{Cuckold}}: [[spoiler: Solomon Grundy]], whose wife was cheating on him with Humpty Dumpty.

Not to be confused with the Music/{{Genesis}} album ''[[PunBasedTitle Nursery Cryme]]''.

* DefectiveDetective: {{Invoked.}} One of the many tropes deliberately enforced by the Guild of Detectives, who demand that their members have broken marriages and drinking problems. In ''The Big Over Easy'', Jack spins a web of lies about his dysfunctional personal life on his Guild application, and the investigator who shadows him is ultimately disappointed to learn that Jack is a happily married father of five.

** In ''The Big Over Easy'', [[spoiler: Dr. Quatt and the monster she created from Humpty Dumpty are running away, with a different squad of police in hot persuit. Seized by an impulse, Jack cuts down the beanstalk, which just happens to fall exactly on top of them, crushing them to death.]]

* MyHovercraftIsFullOfEels: When Mary attempts to speak binary with Ashley's family, she turns simple greetings into something Ashely's mother would never do or a statement about how her prawns have asthma.

* StarfishAliens: The Rambosians, despite ''looking'' like TheGreys, actually have incredibly BizzareAlienBiology and BizzareAlienPsychology.
* StepfordSuburbia: ''The Fourth Bear'' opens in Cautionary Valley, a suburb where children are so all perfectly well behaved it's creepy. This is because in the valley, cautionary tales do come true, and so liars pants catch on fire etc. The children there are scared into obedience in a way that is remarked upon as deeply unnatural.

* FairyTaleFreeForAll: Nursery rhyme and fairy tale character all exist in the same world.

* LiteraryAllusionTitle: Egg-related pun on ''Film/TheBigEasy''.

* NeverLiveItDown: InUniverse, Jack has a reputation for [[Literature/JackTheGiantKiller killing giants]] that he's at pains to deny.

** In the first book, Jack has five minutes [[spoiler: to [[BombDisposal diffuse]] a sandwich-based bomb.]]

* BombDisposal: [[spoiler: Jack has to diffuse a bomb near the end, with an elaborate puzzle involving a two-way mirror, an identical [[TwinSwitch twin]] butler, and a [[ItMakesSenseInContext rapidly-curling sandwich.]] ]]

* {{The Casanova}}: Humpty-Dumpty, somehow. May be shades of KavorkaMan (he is a large egg, after all), but Humpty is recalled as a kind gentleman.

* HotSkittyOnWailordAction: Ashley and Mary go out on a date, have a lot of fun, but she notes that they're entirely incompatible on a physical level.

* StepfordSuburbia: ''The Fourth Bear'' opens in one.