User:Jongerman

Greetings, nice to meet you. I'm currently a psychology lecturer at Rutgers in New Jersey.

I just love Terry Pratchett and have read the genius for years. My fave Pratchett novel is Wintersmith. For those unfamiliar, _Wintersmith_ is the latest entry in Pratchett's three-book sub-series about a young witch growing up and learning, appropriately enough for her trade, to be a wise woman. (there are upwards of thirty or forty "Discworld" books total, which cluster into subgroups around individual characters). New readers shouldn't read this one first; start with _Wee Free Men_, the first in Tiffany's sub-series, and then read _A Hat Full of Sky_ before proceeding to this one.

This is billed as a children's book, although little sets it apart from Pratchett's other fantasy except for some slight bowdlerizations for the young reader; primarily, this is a children's book because the heroine is a young person. . It might more properly be billed as a "young adult" book. Like the Harry Potter books, the content and tone of the Tiffany series have been maturing ever so slightly with each book, and Tiffany herself is portrayed as very mature for a child her age - a portrayal deliberate on Pratchett's part, I believe, as Tiffany is exactly as mature as most kids that age tend to think they are, and almost as mature as she herself wants to be.

Tiffany turns thirteen in this book, and puberty is definitely the theme: in the most expert intertwining of story and myth I've yet seen Pratchett accomplish, Tiffany "steps into the dance" between the Summer Lady and "Wintersmith." Accidentally taking on the Summer Lady's role, she becomes subject to the Wintersmith's advances, and as he is the elemental spirit of winter, cold, frost, ice, etc., problems ensue. Pratchett's typical humor is present throughout (at one point, when plants begin to sprout at Tiffany's feet, one practically-minded character gets her to shove her feet into a pot of onion seeds) but the truly impressive thing about this novel is how expertly Pratchett manages to use myth and metaphor to write about a young girl becoming, ahem, fertile, while still maintaining the decorum appropriate to a british children's book.