The Fifth Elephant (Hardback)

Publisher and industry reviews

UK Kirkus review

When is Pratchett going to run out of steam? When wonderful comic ideas are stretched beyond their natural life, the effect is inevitably disastrous, but such is the fecundity of Pratchett's imagination that his now massively extended Discworld sequence seems to generate new concepts and hilarious conceits of its own, with Pratchett the mere chronicler. This latest instalment in a cycle whose following has increased from book to book features a favourite Pratchettian character, Sam Vines - this time a man on the run. Yesterday he was a duke and simultaneous chief of police and ambassador to the mysterious country of Uberwald, but now he's freezing his nether parts off struggling through a forest to prevent a terrible war. And if that's not enough, there are werewolves on his trail. This time around, the mad panoply of dwarves, diplomacy and a shewed reflection of the more unlikely aspects of our own society yields a freshness that had perhaps been slipping in the last couple of books. This is vintage Pratchett, and aficionados will lap it up. (Kirkus UK)