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dhiyanah's review against another edition
adventurous
funny
hopeful
mysterious
relaxing
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
4.5
Content Warnings
Minor: Child abuse, Child death, Domestic abuse, and Body horror
bluejayreads's review against another edition
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.75
The Tiffany Aching books all have a pattern. Some sort of magical evil being or force comes to the Chalk or after Tiffany herself. Tiffany must gather information and figure out what the thing is and how to stop it and rein in the Nac Mac Feegle while doing it. And then even though Tiffany is a child, she has to deal with it herself, occasionally advised but never helped by the older witches. And then, obviously, she deals with it. I don’t feel like that is a spoiler because the book never really has any doubt – it tries to make it sound like Tiffany could fail, but the reader knows she won’t and the real question is just how she does it.
In this book, Tiffany is 15 (and turns 16 somewhere during the story). She is The Witch now, coming into her own as the witch of the Chalk but still not entirely sure how to balance a witch’s duty of caring for others with taking care of herself. All throughout the book people were pointing out that Tiffany had to take better care of herself if she wanted to effectively help others, but I don’t elevate that to a theme because it never gets resolved. Tiffany does not take any of the advice, and in fact does not get a good night’s sleep until the last few paragraphs of the book.
All the attempted themes were a little muddled in this one. I think “it’s okay to ask for help when you need it” was trying to be a theme, as Tiffany needs to get the help of several people through the course of the story, but that’s undercut by the fact that if she were to ask another witch for help, they would lose all respect for her. Tiffany gets help from non-witches, but the “being a witch means dealing with everything yourself” message counteracted the “it’s okay to ask for help” message.
This book also introduced a lot of new and interesting characters: Roland’s fiance and her horrible mother, an abused girl from town who is definitely … something, a witch from Ankh-Morpok, and a guard at the Baron’s castle who is way smarter than he pretends to be. Esk from Equal Rites even made an appearance as an adult. I enjoyed all the new characters and dynamics in play, and I found myself really liking Preston, the guard. I’m hoping they all show up in the next Tiffany Aching book.
There’s only one Tiffany Aching book left, and even though I’m sad I’ve almost come to the end of my adventures with Tiffany, I have really high hopes for it. It’s also the last book in the Discworld series, though, so I’m considering waiting until I’ve read the rest of the series to make it a capstone of sorts for my Discworld reading experience. But I may just get too excited about reading more about Tiffany. We’ll see.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Miscarriage, Fire/Fire injury, Domestic abuse, and Physical abuse
Moderate: Death, Death of parent, Body horror, and Suicide attempt
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