Cover Art: Whelan painting the final Wheel of Time & Pratchett's latest

Tor recently announced the cover artist for AMOL ( A Memory of Light), the final book in the long-running wheel of time series - Michael Whelan. Last year, I posted here about how he was picked to design the cover for the AMOL ebook, and now, due to the previous cover artist's death, he will be designing the jacket for the print books too.
He does pretty good work (see The Way of Kings cover here). I just hope these are better than the really ugly covers we've seen from Tor before - see earlier Wheel of Time covers here. In contrast, the ebook covers are impressive! My favorites are the ones by Sam Weber (pictured to the right here) and Raymond Swanland.



In other exciting Pratchett news, the cover for Dodger is here. Dodger is an upcoming Victorian-era novel, not set in the Discworld. This is probably going to be a good place to start for non-Pratchett readers too. What a fantastic year this is going to be for Pratchett fans!! Dodger in September, a new June release collaborative novel, and a new Discworld novel later this year to conclude the Moist van Lipwig trilogy.

Teaser: Terry Pratchett and Dark side of the Sun

The book I'm reading in my daily commute today is Terry Pratchett's The Dark side of the Sun.
From the first line of Page 27:

As he walked toward the domes he was aware of the silence. It spread out from him like a wake, from man to man.

(Bonus Teaser below, because this is a fantatic quote)

"I perceive a possibility of an immediate chronological sequence of events which includes a violence," said Three. He stepped back, "I express preference for a chronological sequence of events which precludes a violence."

Mini Review:

The author is one of my favorites, and while this isn't his best work, I am doing a very diligent re-read of Terry Pratchett's entire catalogue.
Highly recommend you start with either Night Watch or any book in the DEATH series, don't worry about an order or timeline. His books are hysterically funny, great to read and re-read, and very imaginative.

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To join into the TT fun, visit the link below!

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along!

Read-a-Thon: Hourly updates Here #3

We are now in Hour 18 of the Thon

10:30 AM: Reading Thud! now.

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Mini Challenge #17 Ban This Book! 

A nod to Banned Books week: "Ban" a book - find a ridiculous way to get a book challenged! 

Dear Librarian/Custodian-of-our-children's minds, 

I am bringing to your attention a most persuasive book by Neil Gaiman by the name of Sabriel. This book encourages 16 year olds to leave school in order to help their father. (wouldn't they help More by studying like a good girl?) That is just the beginning, dear librarian. The story incites travel, battling demons and then crossing into the land of the dead. A major part of the story is demonology and should be banned from the gentle minds of our children. How dare a book tell them about spirits and crossing over? The kids will be scarred for life!! Also, Whistling is involved and Sabriel uses whistling to escape - do you really want our children to pick up such rascally habits?

Sabriel also proves this by later coming back to her school and causing a revolt amongst the teachers, demanding their help in battling the demon. This results in a lot of dead people. I must insist that you ban this book immediately, and ensure that tales of demons, the dead, self-discovery, young romance and whistling do not despoil the children.

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12:30 PM: Pages done - 132 of Thud! 888+132= 1020 since I began the ReadaThon.
Mini-Challenge Won: The Love Hate Mini-Challenge - I won!

Quick Review: Thud! is absolutely hilarious; My reading has slowed down so I can capture each hidden joke in Pratchett's writing.

'Get a troll in der middle o' a load of dwarfs, he is like a fox in der...dem fings wi' wings, laying dem egg fings...' "Fox in a henhouse?"

FIFA Time Read!

Grade: A+

As always, I love Terry Pratchett. I re-read Unseen Academicals, and I MUST recommend that you read it while the football FIFA season is on.

If I could do this review with only excerpts with this most fantastic of books, I would.

Excerpt:

"A chant came past. It had started somewhere at the other end of the game and, whatever it had been once, it was now just four syllables of roar, from hundreds of people and many gallons of beer. As it faded, it took the warm, belonging feeling away with it, leaving a hole."

This is Pratchett’s writing at its most brilliant, with all the fanatical obsession with Football that you would expect.

Unseen University, The Discworld’s premier institution is in the center of the football resurgence at Ankh-Morpork. A hotbed of different stories, The wizards are playing football with the locals, the Dean has left the university to join a rival and is paying a return visit to gloat, there is a new species on Discworld.

The story meanders across different plot-lines, with social commentary on the cult of football, the racial prejudice seen in any society and gay wizards.

All the UU characters feature here – Ponder Stibbons, the Archchancellor, the kitchen staff (new characters), the candle dribblers, and the various Chairs. The older characters like DEATH, Vimes and the Luggage, have cameos, but the second half of the book features a new romantic duo find each other and fumble through the initial stages of dating. This section made for a much better read now, during the football season, that it did at first.

There are gems of one liners – “Now, I am concluding this meeting, although what it has in fact concluded I shall decide later.' “

I am a football novice, so I can attest that this great novel will be absorbing and funny, whether you follow football religiously, or during the FIFA worldcup, or just the WAG crew. You now have 11 more days till 11th July and the Finale, so hurry up!