Book Review: Thief of Time

So, I definitely flaked out on writing what I meant to write on Friday. This week, though, will be full of blog posts. Promise, guys.

Anyways...

Thief of Time, by Terry Pratchett, is one of my favorite books - the others being, in no particular order, Memories of Ice, by Steven Erikson, Ender's Shadow, by Orson Scott Card, Good Omens, also by Terry Pratchett, but also Neil Gaiman, and Anna Karenina, by Leo Tolstoy.

What do these books have in common? Well, they're all awesome, but, beyond that, the answer is nothing.

Back to Thief of Time. While technically part of a series, the book can be read by itself without losing out on much of anything. I will, however, highly recommend the rest of the Discworld series if you enjoy Thief of Time, as they are all somewhat similar in humor and whatnot.

In Thief of Time, a group of creatures known as Auditors - eternal entities with no self designed to make sure the universe runs as intended - attempt to stop the flow of time to prevent the sentient beings of Discworld from mucking everything up so much with qualitative stuff. There are also time monks and Death - who speaks IN ALL CAPS - and a lot of other interesting and/or uninteresting things.

You might think this sounds serious and/or complicated, but it's neither. As per Terry Pratchett's usual style, the book's a little absurd, very funny, and well written in pretty much every way. There are also puns.* All of the puns. Did I mention I like puns?

The book is also easy to read, brings up some interesting ideas in a humorous fashion, and, as with all Terry Pratchett books, can be likened to the more well-known Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy series, but for fantasy.

So, in short, Thief of Time is short, awesome, very punny, easy to read, thought-provoking, and well-written. Assuming you care at all for fantasy and/or satire, you should read this. Also, everything else Terry Pratchett has ever written.

* - Correctly pronounced pune.