This afternoon I took Terry Pratchett's
last novel, The Shepherd's Crown,
to a café (accidentally buying 3 more books on my way into town),
and finished it in 3 hours.
This
novel follows Tiffany Aching as she comes into her own as a
professional witch and has to face up to the increase in
responsibility that entails, as well as another threat of elven
invasion.
I
don't want to give spoilers to anyone who hasn't read it, but I will
say there's a major character death, which feels so autobiographical,
almost as though it's Pratchett's own goodbye to the world, that it
really was very moving above and beyond its implications for the
character within the novel.
The Shepherd's Crown is
full of a joy of life and an optimism about human nature, with
laugh-out-loud moments and some truly wonderful awful puns. It feels
much better put-together than a few of his later works, which for me
felt as though they were lacking in structure, whereas this one feels
like one complete story in its own right. There are a few loose ends,
which is unsurprising for a posthumous publication, but overall it
was a fantastic read, a good balance of plot, humour and pathos.
Now
that I've finished it it's occurred to me that I'll never again be
able to read a new Pratchett novel, and that makes me very sad
indeed.
Next
up: Bridget Jones' Diary by Helen Fielding
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