There’s no such thing as a bad Discworld book, but this one wasn’t my favorite. I know Pratchett probably gets a bit bored with the same characters over and over, and I appreciate that he wants to richly people this world, but I just don’t quite care as much about the freshman class of characters. Moist Von Lipwig is the main character of this one, and he’s fine, but Commander Vimes does not get near enough screentime, and Rincewind gets two footnotes and that’s it! […]

I picked this one up because it seemed Halloweeny, and because scootsa1000 has mentioned it a couple times, and I think I mostly liked the other Peter Straub book I read. I liked the atmosphere and the concept, but I’m not sure I liked the way the story was laid out. Tim Underhill is a writer in New York City. His brother is a booger of a human who lives with his cowed wife and angsty teenage son. When the cowed wife kills herself and […]

This is a pretty straightforward, but beautifully told, Robin Hood story. There are some familiar names and some I’d never heard of. It casts Robin as an accidental symbol, forced into hiding against his will and then used as a figurehead for all the local Saxons who were chafing against Norman rules and taxes. He’s hassled and stressed and doesn’t know what to do with these hopeless people who come straggling to Sherwood Forest, looking for a savior. It’s not his fault that he’s good […]

Every teenager should read this book. It was fun and thought-provoking, and while some of the lessons are a little on the Berenstain Bears side of heavy-handed, there’s enough ridiculousness to even it out. A plane carrying Miss Teen Dream contestants to the pageant finale crashes on a tiny island in the middle of nowhere. Conveniently, all the adults are killed. The survivors must learn to survive, and along the way to learning concrete things like how to collect rainwater in a deconstructed ballgown, they […]