Dragons at Crumbling Castle

Title: Dragons at Crumbling Castle
Author:  Terry Pratchett
Illustrator: Mark Beech
Age Range: 10 – 12 years
Paperback: 354 pages

Book Description:

My Thoughts:

I recently added Pratchett’s Discworld series books, or one of them, to my TBR. While I have heard of the books and the author, I had not read any of his books before. So this is my first Pratchett read, and based on the introduction to this book, this collection includes his earliest works. He wrote these while he was still a teenager, working as a junior reporter with a newspaper. In this publication of those short stories, he had, in his own words, ‘tinkered just a little with few fine details’. And I have to say that I loved that tinkering as much as the short stories themselves!

While ‘The 59A Bus Goes Back In Time’ goes all DeLorean in a ‘vintage bus from a moorish quaint English town’ way, ‘The Great Speck’ reminded me of ‘Horton Hears the Who’ but they all have an uniqueness all their own. I looooved the Carpet People tales included in this book, and for those of you who have already read Pratchett’s ‘The Carpet People’ book, these stories were the origin of the novel. So go ahead, I know you are curious, get the book for yourself, and enjoy the reads. This is for all those who have not heard of or read any of his books too! It is worth it.

The word play, and the play on the words using fonts and font sizes, is AWESOME, just wonderful, TOTally enJOYable! And Mark Beech’s accompanying illustrations are quirky with that right touch of whimsy and comical making it perfect for the stories. They reminded me of Quentin Blake’s style in Roald Dahl’s books.

Rating: 5/5 or an A (hovering on the A+)
Reading Level: 10 – 12 years (all ages in my opinion!)
Reread Level: 4.5/5 – just for the wordplay

Disclaimer:

Since the eARC (Advance Review Copy) of the books from NetGalley expired a while ago, I acquired a copy of the book to read it again and review it well. Thank you to Netgalley for providing me with the initial eARC of this book and introducing me to the same.

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Question to you, dear readers: What is your favorite Terry Pratchett read (if you have read his books)? OR Would you rather read about dragons or time-travel? Let me know…

Writing this post as a series for the Ultimate Blog Challenge and Write 31 Days.  31 Days, 31 Books! This is for Day Fifteen (and I need to catch up on days 16 and 17)

Day 0 Day 1  Day 2 Day 3 Day 4 Day 5  Day 6  Day 7 Day 8 Day 9  Day 10 Day 11  Day 12 Day 13   Day 14