Product Description

Somewhere in a place so far up there is no down, a ship waits to take the nomes home. Masklin knows that the nomes must contact this ship if they are to get home - but he doesn't know how. So they must hitch a ride on a new type of truck with wings called the Concorde - will they ever return home?

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2252784 in Books
• Published on: 1991-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 179 pages

From School Library Journal
Grade 5-9-- The last book of a science-fiction trilogy about four-inch beings who were stranded when their scout ship crashed to earth 15,000 years ago. Truckers (1990) introduced Masklin, leader of a dwindling band of nomes hunting among the hedgerows in modern England. Completely ignorant of their origins, they are guided by a small black box they call "The Thing," which turns out to be a very powerful computer. In Diggers (1991, both Delacorte), they join a group of department-store nomes to live in a quarry. In this last installment, Masklin and friends sneak aboard the Concorde and head for Florida. Their mission: to place The Thing on a communications satellite so it can rouse their waiting mother ship. Nomes are foolishly courageous, companionable, literal and innocent creatures whose repeated misunderstandings confirm readers' sense of smug superiority. The bad puns generated by their mistakes in language may amuse some readers but annoy others. Neither as complex nor interesting as Mary Norton's "Borrowers" (Harcourt) or the Lilliputians of T. H. White's Mistress Masham's Repose (Berkley, 1984), Pratchett's creatures enact a blatantly obvious parable of broadening horizons. Yet the conversational style and fast-moving plot make this cheerful, unpretentious tale useful where there is a need for accessible science fiction, or where the previous volumes have been enjoyed.
- Margaret A. Chang, North Adams State College, MA
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Kirkus Reviews
In book three of the ``Bromeliad,'' the nomes recover their spaceship and leave Earth. At the end of Diggers (p. 109), Gemma and the other nomes, trapped in a quarry surrounded by hostile humans, were saved by the appearance of an enormous spaceship. Wings is a flashback in which Masklin, Grunder, and Angalo sneak aboard a Concorde bound from London to Miami and make their way to within hailing distance of the space shuttle so that Thing can subvert its communication ports to summon their spaceship, which has been stored on the moon for thousands of years. In the process, they meet a band of wild nomes and are told that the world harbors thousands more. Gemma and Masklin leave for the stars; Grunder stays behind to communicate with humans and the other nomes. There is something a bit affected about naming a series after an orchid that harbors a colony of tiny frogs that leave their flower only when they outgrow it. Norton's Borrowers were entrancing, resourceful, and convincing; in comparison, nomes are naive, clumsy, and unlikely. Wings is resolutely earthbound, and while Pratchett can be wildly funny in his adult books, he seems tentative here. Still, young readers who liked the earlier volumes will want to read this one. (Fiction. 10+) -- Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Review
"A delicious, rewarding, wry and antic fable."-Harlan Ellison"A rollicking good story." (Kirkus Reviews )

"Pratchett gives his cast plenty of personality and fuels the plot with nonstop comedy." (Kirkus Reviews )

"Witty, funny, wise and altogether delightful." (Locus )

"Fascinating and funny." (The Horn Book )

"Terry Pratchett has created a wild adventure, a fable, a fantasy, an elegant satire."- Lloyd Alexander (Lloyd Alexander )

"A wry tongue-in-cheek fantasy.which unhesitatingly lampoons the ingrained habits and complacent attitudes found in any society." (ALA Booklist )

Customer Reviews

Terry Pratchett is spelled with two 't' s
Anyone who has ended up here and is looking for more work by Terry Pratchett should do a search for the name spelled with two 't's. You'll find a lot more.

Why only one Terry Prachet book?
If you have anything against a sense of humour - Don't read Terry Prachet. Everyone of my friends are as much in love with his work as I am. If you enjoyed Wings, try a Discworld book! There is none better than Terry Pratchet to help you escape reality for a short time (it's better than any drug!).

Read the Discworld books
I too was annoyed to see that only one of Terry Pratchet's books was available with Amazon. This one was more for the younger teenagers, but the Disc world books such as Guards Guards, and Soul music, are cleverly written. The humour is subtle, and the books make you think about life with an ironic point of view. Try them all