Sign in with Facebook
Loading...
37th out of 46 books
—
513 voters
I Shall Wear Midnight (Discworld #38)
It starts with whispers.
Then someone picks up a stone.
Finally, the fires begin.
When people turn on witches, the innocents suffer. . . .
Tiffany Aching has spent years studying with senior witches, and now she is on her own. As the witch of the Chalk, she performs the bits of witchcraft that aren't sparkly, aren't fun, don't involve any kind of wand, and that people seldom e...more
Then someone picks up a stone.
Finally, the fires begin.
When people turn on witches, the innocents suffer. . . .
Tiffany Aching has spent years studying with senior witches, and now she is on her own. As the witch of the Chalk, she performs the bits of witchcraft that aren't sparkly, aren't fun, don't involve any kind of wand, and that people seldom e...more
Hardcover, 349 pages
Published
September 2nd 2010
by Doubleday Childrens
Friend Reviews
To see what your friends thought of this book,
please sign up.
194th out of 1,143 books
—
4,667 voters
More lists with this book...
Community Reviews
(showing
1-30
of
3,000)
I didn't become a Terry Pratchett fan until 2009. My twin sister told me numerous times that it would be a very good idea for me to read him. I do listen to my twin, it's just that particular urgency to heed her advice hinges on many factors: did she tell me too much (in the interest of fairness, I do this more to her than she does to me), was I feeling a loner and left out of hyper enthuasism... Probably that last one. Everything good about Terry Pratchet you've probably been told or read (or s...more
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
click here.
30 likes · like · see review
In "I Shall Wear Midnight" by (Sir!2009) Terry Pratchett, witch Tiffany, at 16, wants to don black only when old. Yet, for her home Chalk, she already decides life or death, such as when a drunk villager attempts suicide after beating his pregnant daughter to birth. She's wise beyond years, even advising on "passionate parts" as fun fact rather than salacious description, so the rating is not x, restricted.
An evil witch-hunter spectre infects and inhabits the most susceptible. (I miss any menac...more
An evil witch-hunter spectre infects and inhabits the most susceptible. (I miss any menac...more
Love the way that the Witches and The Watch are in the same story. Sad that this is (allegedly) the last Tiffany story however a re-read of the cycle is envisioned in my rocking-chair days.
Best line: Cock-a-doodle-
In no particular order, the results so far
5* Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch
5* Nation
2-3* Johnny Maxwell trilogy
3* Strata
3* The Bromeliad Trilogy
3* The Dark Side of the Sun
3* The Discworld Companion
3* The Color of Magic (Discworld, #1)
3* The Light...more
Best line: Cock-a-doodle-
In no particular order, the results so far
5* Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch
5* Nation
2-3* Johnny Maxwell trilogy
3* Strata
3* The Bromeliad Trilogy
3* The Dark Side of the Sun
3* The Discworld Companion
3* The Color of Magic (Discworld, #1)
3* The Light...more
3 likes · like · see review
Oct 29, 2010
Carol
rated it
5 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
anglophiles, folklore fans, anyone who needs a good laugh, fans of the other Tiffany Aching books
Terry Pratchett is a genius! This book is the fourth in the Tiffany Aching Adventures, and my favorite so far, I think. Tiffany is a sixteen-year-old witch, self-assured and very wise beyond her years, yet still down to earth (or, in her case, chalk) and still sixteen. She is once again joined by her small, blue, kilted, ale-drinking, fist-fighting, hygienically challenged, oft-invisible clan of Nac Mac Feegles who provide the story's comic relief. Her nemesis this time is the Cunning Man--the p...more
4 likes · like · see review
I love these Tiffany Aching books. This latest is quite interesting. Tiffany is now 16 and pretty much handling her "steading" on her own. She has seen and learned things most girls her age haven't. She had her training under some of the best witches. But apparently something happened when she kissed Winter. Something is wrong in her world. People are being suspicious of witches and accusing them of awful things. Tiffany herself is accused of killing the old Baron and stealing gold. She had been...more
I would read the phone book if Terry Pratchett wrote it. I have read all his books; including the ones for kids and young adults. I've given away a fortune in his YA and kids' books at schools.
I am only a short way into the book but it is already filled with Pratchett's signature wit and (yes) wisdom. No one uses the English language like Pratchett. If I sound like FanGirl, it's because I am, absolutely. Pratchett makes Tiffany "feel" like a real 16-year old girl; with all the confusion and ang...more
I am only a short way into the book but it is already filled with Pratchett's signature wit and (yes) wisdom. No one uses the English language like Pratchett. If I sound like FanGirl, it's because I am, absolutely. Pratchett makes Tiffany "feel" like a real 16-year old girl; with all the confusion and ang...more
8 likes · like · see review
This book started off in a deceptively simple fashionin which, initially, I felt rather too much was being told rather than shown. This simplicity soon, however, gave way to stark and sober horror, as young witch Tiffany is faced with an everyday situation of family violence and abuse. The suggestion of violence, ignorance and cruelty is a keynote of the book, as Tiffany faces an enemy darker and more real than any Queen of the Fairies - an embodiment of those worst aspects of human nature that...more
This is more of the same for this subseries – which is a good thing! More adolescent witch adventures, more growing up too fast, more dry humor with teeth underneath.
Critics go on about how magic in fantasy novels is a metaphor for political power or social power or insert power here. Which is usually a really unsatisfying reading to me because fantasy novel magic is so often inborn, inexplicable, a random or genetic gift. Which is a good metaphor for social power, often, but it’s not very inter...more
Critics go on about how magic in fantasy novels is a metaphor for political power or social power or insert power here. Which is usually a really unsatisfying reading to me because fantasy novel magic is so often inborn, inexplicable, a random or genetic gift. Which is a good metaphor for social power, often, but it’s not very inter...more
7 likes · like · see review
Yeah Terry Pratchett!
This was a welcome visit back with a good friend.
Pratchett can't write fast enough for me, but I every time i get to read another of his books, I feel anticipation, happiness and satiety.
Gushing aside, I very much enjoy Pratchett's writing style. His characters and events are full of surprises. People (or feegles) act in a predictable way up to a point, but it always seems as if everyone's actions are driven by their individual thoughts, feelings, beliefs (and magic, of cour...more
This was a welcome visit back with a good friend.
Pratchett can't write fast enough for me, but I every time i get to read another of his books, I feel anticipation, happiness and satiety.
Gushing aside, I very much enjoy Pratchett's writing style. His characters and events are full of surprises. People (or feegles) act in a predictable way up to a point, but it always seems as if everyone's actions are driven by their individual thoughts, feelings, beliefs (and magic, of cour...more
I still feel weird putting these under the heading of "children’s books." They aren't, really, and never have been. Even when the main character was just a ten year old girl.
So. This is the last of the Tiffany Aching books and the last time we will ever hear of Granny Weatherwax or Nanny Ogg ever again, thanks to Mr. Pratchett's disease. I am given to understand that most of this book was, by necessity, dictated.
And it's not a bad book. Quite good, given the circumstances. But a lot of character...more
So. This is the last of the Tiffany Aching books and the last time we will ever hear of Granny Weatherwax or Nanny Ogg ever again, thanks to Mr. Pratchett's disease. I am given to understand that most of this book was, by necessity, dictated.
And it's not a bad book. Quite good, given the circumstances. But a lot of character...more
5 likes · like · see review
I Shall Wear Midnight is Terry Pratchett's final book in the Tiffany Aching series. While clever, thoughtful, and well-constructed, it suffers from the same problem Pratchett has had in his other recent books: he has fallen too much in love with his characters to truly hurt them. Compared to the latent menace that suffused, for example, The Wee Free Men, we never feel here that Tiffany is at any risk that she can't overcome through prodigious application of witch-bourne moxie. This is a drawback...more
4 likes · like · see review
Um- how did I miss this book? With all of the book sleuthing I do, I had no clue that this had been released. Will be ordering it on Amazon....today!
I just finished this fourth Tiffany Aching adventure. Two Words: Printz Award. This is the best YA book I have read this year. This is the best Pratchett book I have read - better than Nation. It helps that I love Tiffany and the Nac Mac Feegle. These characters do not disappoint. The best part is that they have grown and developed - yes, even Rob A...more
I just finished this fourth Tiffany Aching adventure. Two Words: Printz Award. This is the best YA book I have read this year. This is the best Pratchett book I have read - better than Nation. It helps that I love Tiffany and the Nac Mac Feegle. These characters do not disappoint. The best part is that they have grown and developed - yes, even Rob A...more
1 like · like · see review
I Shall Wear Midnight is supposedly that last novel about the young witch from the Chalk, Tiffany. In some ways that knowledge colors the book.
Tiffany has done with her education and is back home serving as the Chalk's witch. Sadly, strange things seem to be happening, more than just what happens with an senient cheese named Horace, a lawyer who is frog (but who can be paid in beetles) and the Feegles around.
In some ways, the novel feels like a good-bye, if not to the Disc than to Tiffany. This...more
Tiffany has done with her education and is back home serving as the Chalk's witch. Sadly, strange things seem to be happening, more than just what happens with an senient cheese named Horace, a lawyer who is frog (but who can be paid in beetles) and the Feegles around.
In some ways, the novel feels like a good-bye, if not to the Disc than to Tiffany. This...more
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
click here.
1 like · like · see review
Feb 04, 2012
Stephen Collins
rated it
5 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
cannonball-read-2012,
fiction-and-suchlike
A big, fat 5/5 for this, the final Tiffany Aching book, from me.
As she does for my friends, Nathan and Courtney, the young Miss Aching appeals no end; she is moral, caring, a thinker and understands that while she has a place in the world, it is often complicated by difficult or potentially unpopular decisions.
Though Pratchett originally wrote this subset of the Discworld novels for a younger audience, there's absolutely no reason they ought not be on the reading list of any Discworld fan. Nay,...more
As she does for my friends, Nathan and Courtney, the young Miss Aching appeals no end; she is moral, caring, a thinker and understands that while she has a place in the world, it is often complicated by difficult or potentially unpopular decisions.
Though Pratchett originally wrote this subset of the Discworld novels for a younger audience, there's absolutely no reason they ought not be on the reading list of any Discworld fan. Nay,...more
There's just something about the Discworld books. I pick one up, thinking to myself that I'll read a few pages, and surface an hour or two later having read hundreds. I devour them, or they devour me. This last Tiffany Aching book is no exception at all.
I find myself unable to write a review of a Discworld book. I have fallen so deeply in love with the entire world that I just can't manage it. One thing I will say: I got the feeling, reading it, that this would be the last Tiffany book, just as...more
I find myself unable to write a review of a Discworld book. I have fallen so deeply in love with the entire world that I just can't manage it. One thing I will say: I got the feeling, reading it, that this would be the last Tiffany book, just as...more
It has been eighteen years since I read a Pratchett book, and so I haven't kept up with the recent goings on in Discworld, but I picked this book up in the library on a whim. Tiffany Aching is a great young heroine and, although the main story takes a little while to get going, once the supernatural villain arrives and threatens Tiffany's life it becomes a very enjoyable read. After finishing it I wished it was a hundred pages longer, and then wondered why I hadn't read a Prachett book in eighte...more
Wow. I was making happy meeping noises at the end, which caused my husband to ask whether I was happy or sad. This was a valid question, as 20 minutes earlier I'd mentioned that I really should be getting to bed, but I needed to know how it all worked out RIGHT NOW.
Totally worth it. If this is the last Tiffany book ever, I'll be a little sad. I'd love to see her make the jump from YA to Adult books and see what she does with her life. Still, this was a wonderful story and I'm so glad I had the c...more
Totally worth it. If this is the last Tiffany book ever, I'll be a little sad. I'd love to see her make the jump from YA to Adult books and see what she does with her life. Still, this was a wonderful story and I'm so glad I had the c...more
2 likes · like · see review
Aug 06, 2011
Graham Tapper
added it
Though set in the Disc world, this is not a Discworld novel. It's the fourth in the Tiffany Aching series of stories, about the young witch. As such it is classified as a "children's book" but then it is as much a children's book as those of Roald Dahl, J K Rowling or Eoin Colfer. Let's just say, it's a book with a child as the major character but which could equally be read by someone aged 9 as 90.
I have read all of the previous stories and loved them as much as I have loved every book Pratchet...more
I have read all of the previous stories and loved them as much as I have loved every book Pratchet...more
Terry Pratchett is a genius! This book is the fourth in the Tiffany Aching Adventures, and my favorite so far, I think. Tiffany is a sixteen-year-old witch, self-assured and very wise beyond her years, yet still down to earth (or, in her case, chalk) and still sixteen. She is once again joined by her small, blue, kilted, ale-drinking, fist-fighting, hygienically challenged, oft-invisible clan of Nac Mac Feegles who provide the story's comic relief. Her nemesis this time is the Cunning Man--the p...more
The Tiffany Aching books and their characters are quickly joining the ranks of the Witches and the Watch as one of my favorite cast of characters from Pratchett's Discworld series. This newest installment brings back all the charm of the precocious protagonist along with the Nac Mac Feegles - somewhat unidimensional creatures that Pratchett manages to turn into engaging, if somewhat single-minded persons. Tiffany is older now, but she still teaches the lessons that give this book a much wider de...more
EDITORIAL REVIEW: It starts with whispers. Then someone picks up a stone. Finally, the fires begin. When people turn on witches, the innocents suffer. . . . Tiffany Aching has spent years studying with senior witches, and now she is on her own. As the witch of the Chalk, she performs the bits of witchcraft that aren’t sparkly, aren’t fun, don’t involve any kind of wand, and that people seldom ever hear about: She does the unglamorous work of caring for the needy. But someone—or something—is igni
...more
The Tiffany Aching Discworld books are technically YA, but there's no less violence, no greater use of euphemisms for bodily functions, and certainly no fewer footnotes than other Pratchett -- and I wouldn't have it any other way.
This is probably not the end of the Tiffany Aching story, but it puts a nice cap on the cycle of Tiffany and Roland and their non-romance, and romance is definitely in the air here: It starts with a pregnant young woman who has lost her child to domestic violence, and e...more
This is probably not the end of the Tiffany Aching story, but it puts a nice cap on the cycle of Tiffany and Roland and their non-romance, and romance is definitely in the air here: It starts with a pregnant young woman who has lost her child to domestic violence, and e...more
Like a pair of comfy old slippers, reading this final Tiffany Aching book - I Shall Wear Midnight - is a familiar, pleasant experience that is boh enjoyable and welcome. Although set on the Discworld, it is one of Terry's "young adult" books and therefore slightly separate from the main Discworld series. Howver, the only real differences between this and his more 'adult' books are that the protagonist is a girl (well, now a young woman), it has a linear narrative which almost exclusively follows...more
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
click here.
Tiffany Aching is facing an insidious evil; "poison goes where poison is welcome". Not a literal poison, but a poison of souls that causes the people who need witches to question, misinterpret, and attack people like Tiffany. Tiffany spends her days helping people, she goes to "feed them as is hungry, clothe them as is naked, and speak up for them as has no voices". What comes for her is blind and hateful.
To add to this, the Baron is dying, his son is under the spell of someone other than Tiffan...more
To add to this, the Baron is dying, his son is under the spell of someone other than Tiffan...more
I finished this book (which marks the conclusion of the Tiffany Aching series), and I feel... confused about it. Don't get me wrong, this is an excellent book, but there were one or two things that didn't really gel with me.
Ok, so to give you a rough overview of the book, Tiffany is now (more) grown-up at the age of 16 and a very busy full-time with. But with Roland about to marry another girl (yes, you read right), and a strange force that is turning people against witches, she's got her hands...more
Ok, so to give you a rough overview of the book, Tiffany is now (more) grown-up at the age of 16 and a very busy full-time with. But with Roland about to marry another girl (yes, you read right), and a strange force that is turning people against witches, she's got her hands...more
There is nothing like Terry Pratchett to make me laugh out loud, adore the characters and truly get swept up in a story. I've been trying to steer clear of my usual books with strong male characters, and read some with females playing a strong main role. Tiffany is a wonderful character, utterly human and remains, as always, the hag o' the hills.
The Feegles will never get old and I shall never tire of reading the word 'Crivens' pop up at unexpected intervals.
Pratchett paints a wonderful story...more
The Feegles will never get old and I shall never tire of reading the word 'Crivens' pop up at unexpected intervals.
Pratchett paints a wonderful story...more
I love Pratchett's Discworld and Tiffany Aching is one of his most endearing characters, a young proto-witch who lives in 'the chalk' where people keep sheep and life is simple... until the Nac Mac Feegles, the Wee Free Men get involved. In this, the fourth Tiffany book, she's already doing the regular duties of a witch, (you know, cutting old ladies' toenails, bending for them as can't bend and wiping for them as can't twist) though still in her teens. It's a cross between being a district nurs...more
There are no discussion topics on this book yet.
Be the first to start one »
Sir Terry Pratchett sold his first story when he was thirteen, which earned him enough money to buy a second-hand typewriter. His first novel, a humorous fantasy entitled The Carpet People, appeared in 1971 from the publisher Colin Smythe. Terry worked for many years as a journalist and press officer, writing in his spare time and publishing a number of novels, including his first Discworld novel,...more
More about Terry Pratchett...
Share This Book
6 trivia questions
More quizzes & trivia...
“Evil begins when you begin to treat people as things.”
—
128 people liked it
“She heard him mutter, 'Can you take away this grief?'
'I'm sorry,' she replied. 'Everyone asks me. And I would not do so even if I knew how. It belongs to you. Only time and tears take away grief; that is what they are for.”
—
62 people liked it
More quotes…
'I'm sorry,' she replied. 'Everyone asks me. And I would not do so even if I knew how. It belongs to you. Only time and tears take away grief; that is what they are for.”
Mar 23, 2011 04:38pm
Mar 23, 2011 04:39pm