Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

THE FAIRIES ARE BACK - BUT THIS TIME THEY DON'T JUST WANT YOUR TEETH...

Granny Weatherwax and her tiny coven are up against real elves.

It's Midsummer Night.
No times for dreaming...

With full supporting cast of dwarfs, wizards, trolls, Morris dancers and one orang-utan. And lots of hey-nonny-nonny and blood all over the place.

Excerpt provided by Syndetics

Lords and Ladies Chapter One Now read on ... When does it start? There are very few starts. Oh, some things seem to be beginnings. The curtain goes up, the first pawn moves, the first shot is fired* -- but that's not the start. The play, the game, the war is just a little window on a ribbon of events that may extend back thousands of years. The point is, there's always something before . It's always a case of Now Read On. Much human ingenuity has gone into finding the ultimate Before. The current state of knowledge can be summarized thus: In the beginning, there was nothing, which exploded. Other theories about the ultimate start involve gods creating the universe out of the ribs, entrails, and testicles of their father. There are quite a lot of these. They are interesting, not for what they tell you about cosmology, but for what they say about people. Hey, kids, which part do you think they made your town out of? But this story starts on the Discworld, which travels through space on the back of four giant elephants which stand on the shell of an enormous turtle and is not made of any bits of anyone's bodies. But when to begin? Thousands of years ago? When a great hot cascade of stones came screaming out of the sky, gouged a hole out of Copperhead Mountain, and flattened the forest for ten miles around? The dwarfs dug them up, because they were made of a kind of iron, and dwarfs, contrary to general opinion, love iron more than gold. It's just that although there's more iron than gold it's harder to sing songs about. Dwarfs love iron. And that's what the stones contained. The love of iron. A love so strong that it drew all iron things to itself. The three dwarfs who found the first of the rocks only got free by struggling out of their chain-mail trousers. Many worlds are iron, at the core. But the Discworld is as coreless as a pancake. On the Disc, if you enchant a needle it will point to the Hub, where the magical field is strongest. It's simple. Elsewhere, on worlds designed with less imagination, the needle turns because of the love of iron. At the time, the dwarfs and the humans had a very pressing need for the love of iron. And now, spool time forward for thousands of years to a point fifty years or more before the ever-moving now , to a hillside and a young woman, running. Not running away from something, exactly, or precisely running toward anything, but running just fast enough to keep ahead of a young man although, of course, not so far ahead that he'll give up. Out from the trees and into the rushy valley where, on a slight rise in the ground, are the stones. They're about man-height, and barely thicker than a fat man. And somehow they don't seem worth it. If there's a stone circle you mustn't go near, the imagination suggests, then there should be big brooding trilithons and ancient attar stones screaming with the dark memory of blood-soaked sacrifice. Not these dull stubby lumps. It will turn out that she was running a bit too fast this time, and in fact the young man in laughing pursuit will get lost and fed up and will eventually wander off back to the town alone. She does not, at this point, know this, but stands absentmindedly adjusting the flowers twined in her hair. It's been that kind of afternoon. She knows about the stones. No one ever gets told about the stones. And no one is ever told not to go there, because those who refrain from talking about the stones also know how powerful is the attraction of prohibition. It's just that going to the stones is not ... what we do. Especially if we're nice girls. But what we have here is not a nice girl, as generally understood. For one thing, she's not beautiful. There's a certain set to the jaw and arch to the nose that might, with a following wind and in the right light, be called handsome by a good-natured liar. Also, there's a certain glint in her eye generally possessed by those people who have found that they are more intelligent than most people around them but who haven't yet teamed that one of the most intelligent things they can do is prevent said people ever finding this out. Along with the nose, this gives her a piercing expression which is extremely disconcerting. It's not a face you can talk to. Open your mouth and you're suddenly the focus of a penetrating stare which declares: what you're about to say had better be interesting. Now the eight little stones on their little hill are being subjected to the same penetrating gaze. Hmm. And then she approaches, cautiously. It's not the caution of a rabbit about to run. It's closer to the way a hunter moves. She puts her hands on her hips, such as they are. There's a skylark in the hot summer sky. Apart from that, there's no sound. Down in the little valley, and higher in the hills, grasshoppers are sizzling and bees are buzzing and the grass is alive with micro-noise. But it's always quiet around the stones. "I'm here," she says. "Show me." A figure of a dark-haired woman in a red dress appears inside the circle. The circle is wide enough to throw a stone across, but somehow the figure manages to approach from a great distance. Other people would have run away. But the girl doesn't, and the woman in the circle is immediately interested. Lords and Ladies . Copyright © by Terry Pratchett. Reprinted by permission of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved. Available now wherever books are sold. Excerpted from Lords and Ladies by Terry Pratchett All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.

Reviews provided by Syndetics

Library Journal Review

When an invasion of elves from another world threatens the Kingdom of Lancre, only the intervention of Granny Weatherwax and her sister witches can keep the human populace from succumbing to the enemy's fatal spell. This latest addition to the whimsical "Discworld" series features a tireless flow of tongue-in-cheek humor, lowly puns, and broad, comic vision. Pratchett (Soul Music, LJ 11/15/94) demonstrates why he may be one of the genre's liveliest and most inventive humorists. A good selection for libraries in possession of previous titles in the series. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Publishers Weekly Review

Pratchett (Small Gods) has won an ardent following with his tales of Discworld and his particular brand of comedic fantasy. This latest installment, however, is unlikely to widen his readership. It's circle time on the Discworld; portentous round depressions are showing up everywhere, even in bowls of porridge. Worlds are weaving closer to one another, with unpredictable results. Only the three wacky witches, formidable Granny Weatherwax, crusty Nanny Ogg and scatterbrained Magrat Garlick, can ensure that the worst does not happen: the return of the elves. Trouble is, almost everyone else in the kingdom of Lancre is eager to welcome the ``lords and ladies'' back. They've forgotten that elves are nasty creatures who live only to torture their prey‘humans especially. It's a tempting premise, but underdeveloped by Pratchett, who relies too heavily on his trademark humor, veering into the silly and sophomoric, to fuel the early portions of this fantasy. Only in the last third of the novel does he strike a successful balance among action, imagination and comedy. There is much fun to the tale once the smiling, sadistic elves actually appear, befuddling the townfolk with their beauty and illusion. An earlier arrival would have done much to strengthen this uneven novel. (Oct.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

Booklist Review

This particularly excellent example of Pratchett's Discworld tales tackles the subject of elves. These elves present the image of being cute only to deceive humans. In fact, they are about as agreeable as Hitler's SS. So when a bunch of them decides to crash an entire human kingdom and all its activities, problems arise. The solution is Granny Weatherwax and the witches she leads, who are not exactly nice people, either, exhibiting, as they do, positive glee in slaughtering elves. When applied to as large a body count as this novel affords, Pratchett's light tone is a little unsettling, but otherwise the book is a superior example of Pratchett's inimitable, seemingly endlessly fertile wit. Discworld's loyal readers are beginning to constitute as doughty a band as Xanth's, and all fantasy collections should provide for them accordingly. --Roland Green

Kirkus Book Review

So you think elves are handsome and high-minded, or cute, cuddly, and bring good luck? Nope. Elves are vicious and sadistic, and they stink, according to Pratchett's latest Discworld fantasy romp (Soul World, 1994, etc.), and only their magical glamour enables them to bamboozle humans into believing the opposite. So when the horrid elves threaten to invade, only the savvy witches Granny Weatherwax and Noann Ogg, somewhat assisted by the bumbling wizards of Unseen University, can save the Discworld. As always, Pratchett's brand of comedy has an agreeably wry, self-deprecating quality: ""The chieftain had been turned into a pumpkin, although, in accordance with the rules of universal humor, he still had his hat on."" A so-so addition to a mostly hilarious series. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.