Review.Hogfather - A Discworld novel.
Review.This is the 20th novel in Tery Pratchetts Discworld series. Fans will need no introduction to the Discworld. A disc of a world carried on the back of the giant turtle, the Great A'Tuin. All life is here, played out by an ever increasing cast of characters.
This book deals with Death and his grandaughter, Susan. The problem is that the Hogfather seems to have gone missing due to a lack of belief in the world. Death does his best to fill in.
There is a plot of sorts, but this book rambles too much to show Pratchett at his best. It reads like a number of loosely interconnected micro stories showing the effects of the central postulate... Death as the hogfather, A non disguised Father Christmas figure.
This formula for a discworld book is now becoming a little thin. Wouldn't it be fun if... then write about the effects. Some of the earlier books which were much more tightly plotted, and incidentally, much shorter, showed Pratchetts genius for carrying a joke to much better effect.
Nonetheless, this story has its high points. I particularly like 'Hex', the magical contraption in the unseen university which shows all the behaviour that we would associate with a computer. It runs on ants scurrying around little tubes, Has sheeps heads for storage, and an eggtimer on a spring to show that an answer is due soon. The one overt laugh that this book managed to squeeze out of me was from the passing reference to a sticker on the casing which said, 'Anthill inside'.
A sterling effort and a good read, but I wish Terry would plot tighter and stretch his considerable talents to producing a notable work rather than sticking to the now tired formula.
