The Witch’s Vacuum Cleaner - Pratchett
Audio performance by J. Rhind -Tutt
5 stars

This is a handful of early Terry Pratchett short stories. So much fun. It was a bit dangerous to be driving while laughing so hard. I wish this had been around when my children were young. The audio is very well done and it might have been a good car ride distraction. Although I doubt that they could have appreciated the humor of the ongoing tales of the Wild Western Wales township of Llandanffmnfafegettupagogo. It did have great appeal for someone who grew up watching Gunsmoke and Bonanza. ( )

I read this aloud to my eight-year-old grandson who has a great sense of humour and quite an imagination. So he loves the bizarre nature of some of Pratchett's writing. It's a series of short stories, so made good bedtime or early morning reading over a few days.

We loved the first story, which made both of us laugh aloud at times. It involved a conjurer who suddenly finds that he can do real magic... and doesn't know how to stop. It's cleverly written and appealed to us both.

We also very much liked the last story, about some gnomes, clearly the precursor to the wonderful Bromeliad trilogy ('Truckers', 'Diggers' and 'Wings') which my son read to my grandson a year or two back. However we found that the middle ones, while well-written and involving some creatively unusual situations, rather dragged in places and didn't have much story.

Intended for older children, and, in places, fun for adults too - but this is early Pratchett, not up to the standard of his longer books.

Longer review here: https://suesbookreviews.blogspot.com/2022/08/witch-s-vacuum-cleaner-terry-pratch... ( )

Long before Terry Pratchett became Terry Pratchett! he was a journalist for the Buck's Free Press, writing short stories for their Children's Circle. This is a collection of some of those short stories, enhanced with illustrations by Mark Beech. It also includes commentary after each story by a Suzanne Bridson, though I'd not include that as an enhancement.

I found the stories charming in a Roald Dahl way, except I suspect Pratchett of imagination, whereas I sort of suspect Dahl of LSD abuse. They were funny, witty and there are hidden references to LOTR, C.S. Lewis' work, and hilarious homages to the Wild West, including Maverick. As I read, I kept thinking my nieces would find these fun, if I could get them to just try a story or two (they're reaching that age when the tastes of all adults tank and can't be trusted), and I must bring the collection to the attention of my sister-in-law who insists that teaching small children is fun.

The commentary was meh and in my opinion, skippable. Bridson is, I'm assuming, aiming it at the stories' audiences, and it's obviously meant to steer them towards the full novels. The comparisons she points out are the obvious ones, and she ignores almost all of the careful nuances and subtle wordplay that I appreciated most.

My edition is the slipcased one shown and it's beautiful. Inside I found it included a full colour illustration from Mark Beech, on postcard sized stock, slipped between the pages, a pleasant bonus. ( )

A shorter short story collection from Pratchett's archives, but one that is very well curated. I love the recurrences of the Wild West Wales stories and some of the other repeating adventures throughout.

Advanced Reader's copy provided by Edelweiss. ( )

Like David Walliams' stories, the longer ones are better. The best story in the collection "Rincemangle, the Gnome of Even Moor" was the precursor to Truckers. ( )