You couldn’t say: It’s not my fault. You couldn’t say: It’s not my responsibility. You could say: I will deal with this. You didn’t have to want to. But you had to do it.

In A Hat Full of Sky, the young witch from the Chalk, Tiffany Aching, leaves the land she's always known and has always been a part of who she is, to train to be a proper witch. But while Tiffany may have beaten the Fairy Queen, playing around with magic can borrow trouble and in this case, Tiffany has attracted the notice of a particularly dangerous creature. Luckily, she'll have the help of the Wee Free Men and several witchy mentors because the Hiver is just as cunning as the Queen with fewer weaknesses and even for the granddaughter of Granny Aching, it'll be a challenge.

I think I've said this about every Witches/Tiffany Aching story so far, but I'm here to say it again: this one is my favorite so far. A Hat Full of Sky is even my favorite Witches book of Pratchett's and it's pretty high on my list of Discworld stories. And all of that is because Pratchett really digs into what it means to be a witch in the world of Granny Aching and Granny Weatherwax. If I'd been reading instead of listening to the audiobook, I likely would have highlighted about a million passages.

I just adore the idea that being a witch isn't about the amulets and wands and cloaks and spells, it's about living on the edges and helping because it's what you do. Even when they don't appreciate it. But you still have to have respect because you can't have people stomping on you. And that balance is something that Tiffany learns from both Miss Level, a sweet if rather odd witch who becomes her mentor, and the rather more irascible Granny Weatherwax, who took an interest in Tiffany after she beat the Fairy Queen. I've always loved the bits of philosophy couched with magic and humor that you get with Pratchett but A Hat Full of Sky has exactly the right lessons for young girls and I loved it.

As usual, the narration by Stephen Briggs is just too perfect. He uses a range of voices for the various characters and while I've been loving his voices for the Nac Mac Feegle both here and in The Wee Free Men, I was shocked at how perfectly he handled some of the other, very familiar characters who crop up in this story. Death in particular was out of this world good. I think I'm going to end up buying every Briggs' narration of a Discworld story because I can't get enough.

Tiffany Aching continues to be one of those books that I would happily recommend to any young fantasy fan and particularly for girls. Tiffany is smart, courageous and doesn't need rescuing, the kind of heroine that I would have adored as a kid and love even more now.