News: Book Cover for Dodger by Terry Pratchett

A while back it was announced that in September Doubleday will be publishing a new book by Terry Pratchett called Dodger. This is not a Discworld novel, it is a book for 11+ readers inspired by the Artful Dodger, one of Charles Dickens' most popular characters. I can't tell you much more about it at the moment, as the manuscript is being kept under lock and key whilst it goes through final edits, etc. but I can show you the cover, and also the blurb that is currently shown on Amazon. Terry Pratchett does mystery and adventure in Victorian London? I want to be at the front of the queue for this one!

Dodger is a tosher – a sewer scavenger living in the squalor of Dickensian London.

Everyone who is nobody knows Dodger. Anyone who is anybody doesn’t.

But when he rescues a young girl from a beating, suddenly everybody wants to know him.

And Dodger’s tale of skulduggery, dark plans and even darker deeds begins . . .


And from Discworld Monthly:

In an alternative London, ruled by the young Queen Victoria, an enterprising lad can find adventure and opportunity — if he is very smart, and very, very lucky. Dodger has the brains, the luck — and the cheek — to scrape by on his own.

Everyone knows Dodger, and everyone likes Dodger. Which is a good thing, because life for a boy on the streets is anything but easy. And it’s about to get seriously complicated as a simple haircut turns momentous when Dodger unknowingly puts a stop to the murderous barber Sweeney Todd.

From Dodger’s encounters with fictional villains to his meetings with Darwin, Disraeli, and Dickens, history and fantasy intertwine in a breathtaking tale of adventure and mystery, unexpected coming-of-age, and one remarkable boy’s rise in a complex and fascinating world.