Rating: 
Summary: Reaper Man - A Killer Laugh!
Review: If you've read the other reviews, you probably understand by now that in this episode from the Discworld series, Death gets to take a holiday from his normal duties. This sets up a series of preposterous circumstances that can only be carried off by Terry Pratchett on his insane creation - Discworld.This was the first of the Discworld novels I ever read, and by far and away the funniest! I was reading it on a flight to San Diego, during the in-flight movie - a taut thriller - and laughed so hard that other passengers were removing their headphones and glaring at me, wondering what I found so hysterical in the film. This book turned me into a confirmed Terry Pratchett enthusiast. His tongue-in-cheek attitude towards his world and his wonderfully twisted take on life has helped inspire my own looney creative efforts, much to the delight of my children. Read this book. Then read the entire Discworld series. If you have any sense of humor, you can't go wrong with this one!
Rating: 
Summary: Death with Soul... er, or something?
Review: DiscWorld books that make you go Hmmm... well hmmm! I'm a great fan of Dr. Pratchett and his characters, especially Death, whose character has developed and become richer and more real (and likeable!) with every successive DiscWorld novel. This book, though - well hmmm, who'da thunk it? Death has a romantic streak! And I guess that means so does Terry Pratchett. I don't mean boy-meets-girl and sweaty-palms and live happily ever after (or not) type romance - I mean sweetness and tenderness and sentiment type romance that has nothing to do with hormones - it would have to be, since Death doesn't have the necessary glands for that kind of thing anyway. Hard to explain, really, hmmm... Some reviewers said that this book was deeper and more thoughtful than your average Discworld novel (it is) but they felt it didn't make them laugh out loud as much as some others did. Well, I dunno about that - Reaper Man still dealt me a few good, sudden "pepsi out the nose" guffaws (it's really a bad idea to try to eat or drink while reading these things!) But it also did something no other Discworld novel has done to me - it brought tears to my eyes a few times! If you're a Discworld fan, definitely read this one - it will "flesh" things out a bit (ar!) for you. If you're not familiar with the Discworld, you wouldn't go far wrong to enter it at this door (right, as if there's any right way to approach Discworld!) On the whole I found it one of the more satisfying - in a curiously different way - DiscWorld novels, and it tends to remain a little cool, green spot in my memory. Hmm.
Rating:
Summary: Death, At His Best
Review: This is definately among my favourites in the Discworld series, I find it the most funnny, weird and intriguing out of all Pratchett books. Whenever Death stars in a Pratchett book he is always my instant favorite. Just the whole idea of having a Death, who, is in fact a nice person. The weirdness magnifies as Death has a problem at 'work' and ends up in a farm with a Mrs. Flitworth who teaches him to do more practical things than using a scythe. The other story is about a bunch of misfit wizards, and Windle Poons, who unfortunately died while Death wasn't around, so, he kind of didn't die, just stayed around making friends with other wierd living dead people. The other wizards try to kil him but it just won't work, while they also flick in between social divisions, saying things like 'wiked' and other out of place slang. The book's plot is extremely bizarre, but very fun to read, as are all Terry Pratchett books. Two great stories, and Death's finest moment, in a book, with wizards, and stuff.
Rating:
Summary: A cohesive ending would have made this perfect
Review: "Reaper Man" has all the elements of a good Discworld book. Old friends -- Death, The Librarian -- show up and reap (pun intended) havoc. A gaggle of befuddled wizards leave the sanctuary of Unseen University to try and solve a mystical dilemma. And a sheltered innocent, an old wizard named Windle Poons, learns a little something about himself. All fine and good. The problem, and thankfully it is a rare occurrence in Pratchett's world, is that these elements don't interact enough to create a cohesive whole. Pity. Death gets top billing here, and he is fleshed-out wonderfully (a tough task considering he had no flesh to begin with). A supernatural career crisis leads him to a job harvesting crops, where his skill with a scythe is put to good use. A budding relationship with his new employer, Miss Flitworth, teaches him to actually live. Windle Poons undergoes a crisis of his own. He's died. Well, almost. See, Death is not around to collect him. So what happens? Well, Terry heaps confusing circumstances on poor Mr. Poons. Poons reacts in much of the same way that Death did. He learns to live, too. After 130-years of sheltered existence, not to mention the last 50 years living with a decrepit body, he is liberated by Death. Only Terry could come up with such a wacky but logically sound notion. The rest of the cast of characters, including the Wizards and a rag-tag group of misfits called the Fresh Start Club, lively wander around the plot, narrowly bumping into each other while providing fine comic moments. The Wizards get a little too caught up in their quest, eventually donning cloth headbands and yelling "Yo!" as if going into Rambo-style warfare. Couple this with their sheltered pomposity, and we get truly funny moments. The Fresh Start Club is quite the inspired creation on Terry's part. Their group is made up of the failed undead, including a bogeyman who's scared of people, a wolf who turns into a man during a full moon, and a shy banshee who, instead of wailing, slips a card under your door that reads: "OOoooEeeeOooEeeeOOOeee". I would have liked to spend more time with this motley crew. And Terry's concept of what happens when Death is not around (to collect humanity's deceased life force) is a true revelation. It confused me at first, but upon further reflection, I realized that not only has he conjured up a truly poetic invention, but has made a sly comment on the reign of terror consumerism has inflicted on our culture. I'll say no more; just be prepared to sing for your supper because Terry's not about to hold your hand (with explicit explanation) through these sections. So the elements are all there. But they never interact in any meaningful way. Terry usually manages to tie the varying narrative threads together by the end. The end here is satisfying in its own way (Death's final scenes are poetic and beautiful), but doesn't carry its weight in terms of helping unify the book's structure. It made me think that there were really two or three distinct stories here, slapped together without much afterthought, to create one full-sized book. That was really my only problem. The rest of the book is enchanting and wonderful; a lesser entry in the Discworld series, but fine reading nonetheless.
Rating:
Summary: The Care Of The Reaper Man
Review: I was never much of a fan of humorous fantasy/sf before I encountered Terry Pratchett. Most of what I read in the genre-Robert Asprin, say, and to some extent even the venerable Douglas Adams-depended far too much on the obvious, the over-labored, and the repetetive. (After all, how many different ways are there to describe the effects of a Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster?) What's more, whatever humorous premise the writer comes up with is invariably not enough to sustain a single book, let alone a series of them (with a series of increasingly bad puns for titles).
Then I was introduced to Terry Pratchett, and his hilarious novels of the Discworld, and my outlook on humorous fantasy changed somewhat. I discovered that it is possible to write a humorous fantasy novel not only well, but superbly-and that it is possible to sustain not just a single book, but a series of them, and have that series grow more complex, powerful and meaningful as those books progress. And of Pratchett's Discworld novels, one of the most powerful and meaningful is Reaper Man.
A little background on the Discworld is necessary at this point-but just that, as a little is all that's really needed. The Discworld is what we used to think Earth was-in a word, flat. "Like a geological pizza without the anchovies," as Pratchett himself describes it. The Discworld rests on the backs of four giant elephants, which themselves rest on the back of a truly Jovian turtle-and all this is really beside the point, because Pratchett's books aren't really about the Discworld. They just happen there. These books are far more concerned with people, and their hearts, than with the place they inhabit-which is all to the good, because the books wouldn't be half what they are otherwise.
Reaper Man deals with one of Pratchett's most compelling characters-Death. Yes, Death. Skeletal, long black robe, scythe, all the Bergmanesque caricature you could want . . . yet this Grim Reaper is not a caricature at all. Nor is he particularly grim, come to think of it. He's a craftsman, who takes pride in his work...or did, until the events in this book start. The problem is that Death has begun to become a persona as well as a personification of nature, and as such has become an annoyance to the Auditors, beings whose sole purpose in the universe is not just to serve entropy, but to speed it up wherever possible. They do not want a Death who spends his free time pondering the imponderables of human nature, so they relieve him of his duties, and he descends to the Discworld, a mortal for the first time in his existence.
This, as you might imagine, causes no end of problems for everyone. For one thing, people stop dying at their appointed times-and while that may not seem to be such a terrible thing at first, what about those who were ready to die, expecting it, and who will settle for nothing less? That is the fate of ancient wizard Windle Poons, when he reaches what he thinks is the end of his life. He doesn't. He gets mad, to say the least, and gathering behind him a cadre of disadvantaged undead, Poons sets out to find just what in the world has-or more accurately, hasn't-happened. Meanwhile, Death has found gainful employment as a farmhand (a natural job for a man used to scythework), starts to learn what being a mortal is all about, and becomes more and more obsessed with his own mortality . . . especially when he realizes that someone (or something) has to take his place, and that it might very well be coming after him first . . .
And that is all I can reveal, I'm afraid. If you want to know the rest, such as the fate of Death, and Windle Poons, and many others, you must read the book. But be warned: you should be prepared to laugh very hard . . . and to cry as well. For as funny as Terry Pratchett is, at his best he can also be profoundly moving, and Reaper Man is one of the most moving fantasy novels I have ever written. There are problems with the book-the Windle Poons story is never linked well enough with Death's, and there is a subplot involving prominent Discworld wizards that seems to belong in another book entirely. So what? As good as it is, Reaper Man is not Pratchett's best Discworld novel, a prize which surely must go to Small Gods, or Witches Abroad, or Men at Arms-nor is it his funniest, which must surely be Soul Music, or Interesting Times, or Hogfather, or Lords and Ladies, or . . . well, you get the idea. If I had to pick one author whose books I would like to be stuck on a desert island with, it'd be Terry Pratchett. Quite a turnaround for someone who never liked comic fantasy very much, eh?
Rating: 
Summary: Read Mort Instead
Review: A disappointment compared to the much more successful Mort: a less engaging Death, and an unrelentingly grim world view. Some cleverness (Death winds up working as a farmhand; he's an expert with a scythe, even though he insists on cutting the grain one stem at a time). Even the comic-relief wizards aren't all that funny in this one. The elderly Windle Poons finally dies, and he's a far more interesting character than death, but still undeveloped. Wizards thrown in for comic relief don't do a very good job of it. There's a subplot involving the secret life cycle of shopping malls, but it doesn't work very well.
Rating:
Summary: hilarious
Review: This is the eleventh book I've read in Pratchett's Discworld series and it is by far my favorite. In this chapter, Death (The Grim Reaper) has been fired by the "eternal auditors" and takes up a job as a farmhand. However, without someone to immediately take over his previous job, the undead are walking the streets and wondering why they haven't died yet. They've even started a "dead rights" group. This is a hilarious book. Pratchett's series gets better with every release. I highly recommend it!
Rating:
Summary: Brilliant!
Review: This book got me hooked on the Discworld. Need more? The ideas of spreading cities, along with the wizards, Reg Shoe, and others make it hard to resist for any avid reader. My only advice is to avoid it if you're short on money or don't have a library near you. With around 30 books in the series it can get pretty expensive =p
Rating:
Summary: Death has feelings too
Review: Well, maybe three is a little unfair, but I really didn't like Windle. I bought this book after reading Mort because I really liked the character of Death. The Death plot was really sweet and I loved how he kept Death of Rats and Death of Fleas as pets. I really didn't like the wizards, The Freash Start Club, and Windle Poons though. They really got on my nerves. It was a good enough idea, but it just didn't hold my interest very well. It was kind of drawn out and boring to me...oh well. I would if I could rate this book twice, one for the story of Windle, who gets maybe two and a half stars and one for the story of Death who gets four or maybe five stars. The story of Windle really wasn't that bad, its just that I found it very hard to follow. And the whole shopping mall thing confused the heck out of me.Although Dean getting extremely hyper and continually saying "Yo!" was hilarious. Another thing that bugged me about this book was that it wasn't consistent. When "Bill Door's" ghost is running from the New Death, he can't pick anything up because he's a ghost, yet somehow when Mrs. Flitworth distracts him, he picks up the scythe and kills him. There were a lot of minor errors like that, it was annoying. Maybe I would have enjoyed this book a little more if I didn't have a terrible head ache while trying to read it, but I'm not sure. No matter what the book was like in the middle, the ending was wonderful. I had no idea Death had anything to do with music, let alone be a spectacular danncer! That was completely unexpected. I love how he kept Death of Rats. That was so cute! All in all, I guess I could describe this book with one word in the end: SQUEAK
Rating:
Summary: SQUEAK? SQUEAK.
Review: Death is one of the most interesting recurring characters in the Discworld stories. He's just a regular guy, dealing with a major mission. But now he seems to have acquired a personality and has therefore been sacked from his job. All the smaller deaths -- the Death of Tortoises, the Death of Daffodils, the Death of Rats, and so on -- which used to be subsumed in him are on their own. Death finds he now has a Life-Timer of his own, and the sands of the Future are pouring through the bottleneck of the Present and piling up in the Past. (Pratchett has a terrific way with words.) What else is there for him to do but seek work on a Discworld farm, harvesting corn instead of lives? More important, with no Death to keep it under control, life force is piling up, making its vital presence felt in the form of poltergeist activity and a plague of snowglobes and supermarket baskets, which are only the harbingers of the dreaded appearance of Mall Life. Meanwhile, 130-year-old wizard Windle Poons has just died -- but Death, who is out of a job and not yet been replaced, hasn't come for him. Windle is one of the undead, so naturally he is approached by dead-activists. Then he gets caught up in the struggle against too much life being carried on (reluctantly) by the faculty of Unseen University, of which he was lately a member. And I haven't even mentioned Mrs. Cake and her werewoman daughter, or Lupine, or the grocer vampire, or the bashful banshee who slips notes under doors instead of screaming. Pratchett is a first-rate parodist but he's also a very talented designer of complex and highly original plots and characters.
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