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Tiffany Aching is continuing her training as a witch under the fearsome Miss Treason, though Granny Weatherwax is still keeping watch from afar. Tiffany makes an unfortunate choice during a winter festival and attracts the attention of the Wintersmith, a mythological figure who, this being Discworld, is rather less mythological and more real than Tiffany prefers. Once again, she joins forces with the Nac Mac Feegle to try to overcome this threat...before she is sucked into the mythological story against her will.

Wintersmith is the thirty-fifth Discworld novel (out of forty-one; the ending is just starting to edge into sight) and the third to focus on the character of Tiffany Aching. Nominally, this is a YA-focused Discworld novel. However, given Sir Terry Pratchett's resolute refusal to talk down to younger readers, there isn't a vast amount of difference between this and an "adult" Discworld novel, save toning down Nanny Ogg's double entendres a tiny bit.

Wintersmith's theme, as much as can be said, is about the interaction between mythology and reality. The Wintersmith - not quite a god but more than just a spirit - is brought into the real world by Tiffany's actions and fixates upon her, forcing her to try to find a way of removing his interest.

As is usual with Pratchett, there are plenty of laughs, some impressive character development - Roland, Tiffany's would-be romantic interest, gets plenty of solid advancement here - and some thoughtful musings on the ideas of responsibility and how some people prefer comforting illusions and lies to harsh reality. But the book also has some weaknesses. The Wintersmith himself is the latest in a long line of incorporeal characters who want to become human but don't quite get it (Death famously spent a book or two flailing around this idea) and his level of threat is quite vague for most of the book. The idea of an ancient spirit falling in love with a young teenage girl is also a bit weird, and doesn't really go anywhere.

If anything it's the numerous subplots and side-character which fare much better. Roland's attempts to evade the attentions of his aunts and turn into a good would-be ruler are entertaining, and Tiffany's tutoring of a superficial and apathetic young witch into a more responsible figure feels like it could be a whole book by itself. The Nac Mac Feegle also don't have much to do and Pratchett's attempts at giving them more development feel a bit more perfunctory here than in A Hat Full of Sky. Still, at least they are not overused.

Neither are Discworld heavy-hitter characters Granny Weatherwax and Nanny Ogg, who back off for most of the book to let Tiffany deal with the threat of the Wintersmith herself. This is a good move by Pratchett, who resists the temptation of fanservice to better develop his new(ish) protagonist.

Wintersmith (***½) is a solid, if unspectacular, slice of Discworld. It has great characters, comedic moments and some nice thematic ideas, but the central plot feels a bit wooly and never quite gels together into a concrete threat. But the Nac Mac Feegle storming the Underworld with the help of a sentient cheese and negotiating a discount on crossing the River Styx is an all-timer Discworld moment.

Staffers working near Putin are no longer allowed to use mobile phones or take public transport, the report says, part of a raft of extreme new security measures implemented by the Federal Protective Service (FSO), the agency that protects Russia’s top officials. “Surveillance systems have been installed in the homes of cooks, photographers, and bodyguards,” the document reads.

In addition, Putin and his family have stopped visiting their residences in the Moscow region, and the president has made no appearances at military sites this year. 

As reported by Important Stories, some of the information in the report was independently corroborated. For example, a former FSB officer told reporters earlier this year that it was the FSO, not the FSB, that was responsible for recent large-scale internet shutdowns in Moscow. The same claim is made in the intelligence document.

A current FSB officer told reporters that his unit was having trouble obtaining wiretapping authorization for criminal investigations because “all the equipment has been redirected to monitor the government and other state bodies.”

Amid setbacks in Russia’s grinding war on Ukraine and mounting economic problems, other signs of fear and tension have spilled into the public eye. For the first time in years, the upcoming Victory Day parade in the heart of Moscow will not include any heavy military vehicles, a security decision the Kremlin attributed to Ukrainian drone strikes.

The May 9 celebration — the centerpiece of Putin’s effort to recast his invasion of Ukraine as a continuation of the Soviet war against Nazism — will also be attended by an unusually low number of high-level foreign dignitaries.

An unusual level of discontent has also recently appeared in social media, with Russians voicing their outrage at recent blocking of mobile internet services and rising prices.