Smashbomb

Search

Search results

All (817)

Content

Rachel (48 KP) rated Small Gods in Books

May 24, 2017

Small Gods

Terry Pratchett | 1992 | Fiction & Poetry, Humor & Comedy, Philosophy, Psychology & Social Sciences

8.9

(10 Ratings)

Book Rating

Funny (4 more)

Philosophy

Fantasy

Terry Pratchett

Excellent fiction

The 13th Discworld book

Small God's is the 13th book in the Discworld series. You do not have to have read any of the other books to understand this one as it features characters that (mostly) only appear in this book.

As with all of Pratchett's work it is a subtle blend of humour and humanity. It uses amazing characters and situations to highlight the hypocrisy and insanity of real life.

This book focuses on Brutha; a 'slow', ordinary monk for the God Om. It is the biggest, and most ruthless, religion in this part of the Discworld.
Brutha is gardening, as he always is (not much use for anything else) when a tortoise literally drops into his life and changes his world......

This book questions the hierarchy of religion, the wisdom of power, philosophy, the righteousness of war and whether a tortoise really does make good eating.

Kudos

Phil Leader (619 KP) rated The Midwich Cuckoos in Books

Nov 20, 2019

The Midwich Cuckoos

John Wyndham | 1957 | Science Fiction/Fantasy

7.0

(2 Ratings)

Book Rating

The Midwich Cuckoos does what a lot of Wyndham's fiction does, taking a normal situation of a sleepy rural village then turning it upside down, showing how fragile our comfortable lives could be.

While one of his best known works, I wouldn't personally rank this as highly as say The Day Of The Triffids or The Kraken Wakes. Whereas I would recommend those to anyone, and as stories that mostly still stand up today, The Midwich Cuckoos plays a lot on themes such as Cold War paranoia to achieve much of its effect, and that has obviously diluted over the years.

It's still a good read and full of the usual Wyndham sense of humanity that grounds even the most far fetched of his stories. Perhaps not quite recommended, but worth picking up one day. It just hasn't stuck in my mind like other works, probably not a good sign for something designed to be thought provoking.