Dodger a dodger?

Before the whole of June flies by I thought I would pen a quick post.

I am catching up on (sadly) the last few books ever written by my favourite author, Sir Terry Pratchett. I was popping some books away at work the other day and noticed Dodger on display in our Youth Area. As a title by Pratchett I still needed to cross off my list I snatched it up and placed another title on display in its place.

Unlike Pratchett's Discworld series, Dodger is actually set in Elizabethan England where the main character Dodger crosses paths with some figures from history (namely Charles Dickens and Sir Robert Peel to name but two) as well as some characters created by The author to help pad out the story and move it along.

This is not a funny book, it does have some clever moments though and although our protagonist leaps from Tosher to Lord of the Manor seemingly quickly in the 400 or so pages it is not an unrealistically told tale. The events seem incredible but at the time the story is set perhaps probable and certainly not impossible. I quite like the way that Pratchett looks at the world, just like a journalist for a newspaper with a humoristic slant on the facts. This has been evident in his Discworld novels, in his standalone works and also in the stories he has written for younger kids. I was pleased to see that this same view of the world and the people that populate it was evident in Dodger and that Elizabethan England was described in all its grimy glory with a bit of a tinge of the comic.

I found the character of Dodger to be the sort of hero that you root for all the way through. I had a real pride for the young lad as he overcame obstacle and sticky situation after obstacle and tricky... Well you know what I mean... From the very beginning the drain dweller captured my heart as he did many of the characters he comes across. Sir Terry has once again in Dodger painted us the picture of someone we think we know and it is someone whom we hope with all our might will win the day no matter the odds that need be overcome.

I must admit that Dodger was not the story I was expecting when I first began it. By the first few pages though I was hooked and happy.

I may be (slightly?) biased but I would have to say this is another ripper of a yarn from Pratchett. If you ever wanted to visit Merry Ol' England this is the book for you...

8 out of 10, a real Tosheroon...