By Terry Pratchett.

The Low King of the Dwarves is going to be crowned, and the Patrician of Ankh-Morpork needs to send an ambassador, the Duke of Ankh-Morpork. And who would this high-ranking member of the nobility be? None other than Sam Vimes.

The coronation of the Low King is under threat from other dwarves, vampires and werewolves, but Vimes ( Read more... )

By Peter Oxley.

Bart and Spencer are a couple of petty criminals who have been set adrift in the world of crime, no longer being part of a gang. Spencer, the brains, suggests that they should go straight and comes up with the Great Big Demon Hunting Agency, which doesn’t exactly get off to a good start because the demons nearly brain the pair of ( Read more... )

By DC Farmer.

The book starts fairly slowly. We learn that Matt Danmor was in a car crash in which he was badly injured. His girlfriend, Silvy, was with him, but vanished, and the conclusion seems to be that Danmor took a bit of a knock to the head. He’s in a hospital working as a porter, but is meant to be in his second year training to be a doctor ( Read more... )

By Terry Pratchett.

You might, dear reader, think I’ve gone utterly book-mad in my old age, but on this occasion, I have an excuse. The power was off from about quarter past eight, and as there was nothing else to do, I went and stood in the sun in the annex reading most of the rest of Monstrous Regiment until it was time to head off for lunch, ( Read more... )

By Terry Pratchett.

Dick Simnel invents the steam engine, which he takes to Ankh-Morpork. Harry King funds it, Lord Vetinari raises a suspicious eye, but grudgingly approves, and Moist von Lipwig is put in charge of the whole project of creating a rail network across Discworld.

Lipwig manages to mostly achieve this task, but he’s under particular ( Read more... )

By Terry Pratchett.

Lord Vetinari: I want you to become the governor of the Royal Bank. Moist von Lipwig: No thanks. Ten minutes later… Moist von Lipwig was the owner of Mr Fusspot, the canine chairman of the Royal Bank. “Let’s abolish the gold standard,” said Moist, “and invent paper money.”

Cosmo Lavish: I’m going to turn myself into Lord Vetinari ( Read more... )

By Terry Pratchett.

After having been mostly executed, Moist von Lipwig, a notorious con artist, is offered the job of Postmaster General. The Post Office is in a parlous state. It’s two surviving (?) employees seem to be a few stamps short of an album, and the building is stuffed full of undelivered post. It’s also up against the clacks, a ( Read more... )

By Genevieve Cogman.

Word has got out that a Librarian is doing some work for a dragon who’s in a competition to get promoted in the court of the Queen of the Southern Lands. Irene and Kai are sent to the New York on a world where it’s the 1920s. No matter what Irene and Kai do, they constantly end up in hot water (think of the Warren Beatty film ( Read more... )

By Genevieve Cogman.

Some prefatory waffle.

It’s six years since I read the first two books in the series, although the characters and the settings weren’t utterly unfamiliar, and my reviews of the first two books helped. A quick recap of sorts.

Irene works for the Library. She jumps from one alternative world to another, nicking unique books such as ( Read more... )

By Genevieve Cogman.

Prefatory note.

At the end of The Invisible Library I said, “Unlike the previous two books, I’ve enjoyed this one sufficiently to think the second book in this series is worth trying.” Where was the review? Had I even written a review for The Masked City? As you can see, I did write a review (October 2018), but for reasons now ( Read more... )