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Wintersmith |
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| Author: Terry Pratchett Published: 2006-10-01 |
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List price: $16.99 Our price: $12.37 |
As of: January 07th, 2009 01:50:01 PM |
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Customer comments on this selection. The best of the Tiffany Aching booksThere is little anyone can say in praise of Terry Pratchett that hasn't been said many times over. He is funny and deep at the same time. You can choose to find the random references to human society or you can just sit back and enjoy the story. Either way Pratchett won't dissapoint you. In this book we see Tiffany Aching begin to come into her own in the world of witches. She is no longer the girl that wished for magical powers in The Wee Free Men. Choice and consequences come together in a tale of fantastic proportions as Tiffany attracts the attention of the God of Winter, the Wintersmith. Though considered to be one of Pratchett's adolescent books I have found that age is no barrier to enjoyment of this book. Awesome as always!Terry Pratchett is a comedic genius and this book is another fine example. It is a little bit dark for a "teen" book (I think they like it that way...witness the later Harry Potter books), but always ends well. third in the seriesHow to write about a Pratchett book without it degenerating into incoherent fangirly squeeing? I'll try, but I'm not making any promises. This is the 3rd Tiffany Aching book, which is a subset of the Discworld series. Tiffany is a young witch-in-training. In Wintersmith, Tiffany turns 13, which is a difficult enough time in any girl's life. But Tiffany's not just any girl, so things are exponentially more difficult. Her biggest problem starts when she (unintentionally, to be sure) steps into the dance between the Wintersmith and the Summer Lady, resulting in her taking on some of the attributes of the Summer Lady, and in the Wintersmith falling in love with her. Then her current mentor, Miss Treason, announces that she'll be dying soon, and the race is on to decide who should take over her cottage. Tiffany is likely the best qualified, but Annagramma is older and more likely to be accepted by the locals. Enter Granny Weatherwax and Nanny Ogg. Granny manipulates things in her usual twisted way, and Nanny is her usual blend of practicality and earthiness. And of course there are the Nac Mac Feegles, who are just hilarious. Wintersmith is a young adult novel, but that's mostly because the heroine is 13. The story is universal enough and complex enough to appeal to adult readers as well. Tiffany takes responsibility for a serious mistake--she gets advice and help along the way, but ultimately, she has to fix the problem herself. She also has to bite the bullet, swallow her pride, and focus on what's best for everyone in the long run rather than what makes her happy now. Both of those are lessons that aren't limited to young people--they're not easy for us grown-ups, either. *sigh* Instead of squeeing, I ended up synopsizing. Sorry about that. It's a great book. I'd recommend reading Wee Free Men and A Hat Full of Sky first, and maybe a couple of the Discworld witch books too, so you're familiar with Granny Weatherwax and Nanny Ogg, but you probably don't have to. Tiffany's New BoyfriendI've already read just about everything by Terry Pratchett I can get my hands on. Several times. From "The Carpet People," to "Making Money." I love the worlds Mr. Pratchett's fertile imagination creates. His characters are as real as they can be, people from regular life, just on a different world. I bought "Wintersmith" in the audio version, so I could listen to someone else's interpretation, to augment the voices and personalities I "heard" in my mind when I read the book. Stephen Briggs does a magnificent job of reading into the prose the subtleties and nuances of each of the characters. The story is wonderful, the reading is great, and it makes the miles go by quickly as I listen on my iPod (tm). If you're already a Pratchett fan, I recommend the adventures of Tiffany Aching, as she does her best to convince the Wintersmith that she really doesn't need a cold-shouldered boyfriend at the moment. Read it or listen to it, you'll enjoy it.  The Big Wee Hag is back, and is she ever frosted!What happens when the Wintersmith (discworld's version of Jack Frost) falls in love with a teenage witch in training? Why, he makes snowflakes in her likeness, of course...and then he snows them down on the world by the billions, until the land, the houses and even the sheep are buried in them. And what does a young witch do when she is showered with this sort of attention? Well, she gets very very embarrassed. The whole sordid and hilarious mess is right here in the third book of the Tiffany Aching series: another great young readers novel by Terry Pratchett. You'll have to read the book to find out how Tiffany deals with the affections of the Wintersmith, and all the ways he/it tries to win her love, and how the Nac Mac Feegle come to help the "Big Wee Hag" out of a truly elemental mess. Just be prepared to do a lot of laughing along the way. - C.A. Wulff, author of Born Without a Tail |
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