I’m on to read I Shall Wear Midnight by Terry Pratchett!
I have been working hard on my own books for the last couple of weeks, revising like crazy to get the new editions ready for a convention in November, and my brain feels like mush at this point. I can’t even tell you how much I need Pratchett-style leisure reading. All the way through my last read, I kept subconsciously entering revision-mode, spending 5 times as long to read a page because I was correcting every slightly awkward sentence in the description-heavy dark fantasy book that I was supposed to be reading for fun.
I think something light and humorous is the only thing that will keep my brain from burning down and sliding out my ears right now…
I Shall Wear Midnight
by Terry Pratchett
As the witch of the Chalk, Tiffany Aching performs the distinctly unglamorous work of caring for the needy. But someone – or something – is inciting fear, generating dark thoughts and angry murmurs against witches.
Tiffany must find the source of unrest and defeat the evil at its root. Aided by the tiny-but-tough Wee Free Men, Tiffany faces a dire challenge, for if she falls, the whole Chalk falls with her . . .
I’m really looking forward to getting back to the Tiffany Aching sub-series of Discworld books! But I want to read the rest of the adult witch books first, and then I want to read Hoogfather at Hogswatchtime, so it might be a while before I get back to Tiffany. I hope you manage to enjoy I Shall Wear Midnight without trying to edit it! The hazards of being a writer…
I’m finding that it requires a lot less editing than the last book I read!
Maybe it was because the last one was an English translation of a Polish book, or maybe I’m just so used to Pratchett’s style of writing I don’t feel as much of a need to fix it…
Pratchett does have a very distinct style! Though until recently I was skipping around and reading them all out of publication order, and his earlier works did need more work (in my mind) to be as good as the later books.
His early work is still hilarious, but both the writing and the plots were a bit of a mess compared to what he grew into later.
Agreed, his early work was still good! But I love looking at how he grew. It’s one concrete thing I can point to as a proof that there’s hope for me improving as a writer, too. 🙂
I take comfort from it as well. After revising my own books lately, I can see how book 2 is ten times better than book 1, and book 3 ten times better than book 2, so it’s nice to see that even an author as amazing as Pratchett had to experiment a bit before hitting his stride.