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Pratchett II: The Wrath of Om

Werthead

By Werthead,
in Literature

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The Pita Council Member

The Pita

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Good Omens, written with Neil Gaiman, is a classic so, yes, you should definitely bother with that one.

As far as I know, the only other collaboration worth the name that he has done is The Long Earth, written with Stephen Baxter. That one didn't work for me. I got about half way through before giving up.

I wrote that post ages ago. I have no idea what I was thinking. I've read Good Omens and loved it. It's what made me start reading Neil Gaiman.

...

I honestly have no idea what I was thinking when I wrote that line.

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Jussi Council Member

Jussi

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http://www.npr.org/2013/11/03/241630751/with-fading-memory-terry-pratchett-revisits-carpet-people

On continuing to write as he loses his memory

Siren voices tell me, "You don't have to keep going on." And then you think, "I'm a writer. What do I do? Sit there watching my wife clean up?" I don't know. I like being a writer. The book I'm writing right now is gonna be a good one, I believe. If it gets really bad, get the little men to go into the flying saucer and take me away from it all.

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Jerol Council Member

Jerol

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For some reason, other than Good Omens, I haven't read any Pratchett. I really don't have the reading time to sift through everything. Any notions as to what would be essential?


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alguien Council Member

alguien

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Pratchett has switched his US publisher from HarperCollins to Doubleday. Because of this move, Raising Steam won't be published in the US until March 2014. Here are some quotes from Edelweiss catalog:

Marketing:

Key Selling Points:

Here I go to the USA bookstore today thinking to pick myself up the latest Discworld book only to find that it won't be published in the USA until fucking March!?!?

Goddamit.

I'm happy about the 10 book deal, but this delays sucks balls.

I think I'm just going to order a UK book. I can't wait that long...

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SkynJay Council Member

SkynJay

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For some reason, other than Good Omens, I haven't read any Pratchett. I really don't have the reading time to sift through everything. Any notions as to what would be essential?

More and more I am starting to think Wyrd Sisters is the best starting place, despite being the second in a characters arc. It is one of the strongest early books, doesn't have too many ideas that require knowledge of Discworld, and really showcases the author's talents well.

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lokisnow Council Member

lokisnow

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Small Gods is perhaps the best place to start with Pratchett. It's a stand alone and it's brilliant.



for another standalone, that is of more recent vintage Pratchett, The Truth is also quite good: it's about discworld's first newspaper.



I read that link about doubleday's plans. I'm overall pleased they're publishing all the ancillary books in the US--finally!--but pissed off they're all trade, rather than HC. I'd love nice editions of all the science of discworld books, but I'm not sure I can arse myself to care about PB versions.


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Maester Hodor Landed Knight

Maester Hodor

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Although I have every single Discworld book on my iPad, I've only read 3 Discworld books so far: Equal Rites, Sourcery, and Small Gods. And Equal Rites was my favorite.



I'm not sure what to read next; The first Death book (Mort) or the second Witches book (Wyrd Sisters)



Suggestions?


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Werthead Council Member

Werthead

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Wyrd Sisters is - sort of - a follow-up to Equal Rites (well, Granny Weatherwax is a major character again). Apart from that, there's not much in it. I'm not as enamoured of Mort as many, but a lot of people say it's their favourite Discworld book.


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MinDonner Council Member

MinDonner

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I don't really count Equal Rites as a proper Witches book; Pratchett is never great with consistency anyway, but the first 3 Discworld books I barely even consider canon. ER is the equivalent of those really early Simpsons skits from the Tracy Ullman show, where the characters were all drawn kinda wrong and had slightly different voices.


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Werthead Council Member

Werthead

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I haven't read the Tiffany Aching books or the last couple of main sequence novels yet, but:



Doesn't the main character from

Equal Rites cameo in one of the recent novels?



I agree there is a difference between the early books and what the series turns into roughly from Wyrd Sisters onwards, but they are all still - officially at least - canon. But I do agree that reading Equal Rites is not necessary to enjoying Wyrd Sisters. It's still an okay book in its own right.



I should resume the Discworld reread at some point. I got sidetracked after Soul Music and never got back to it. It doesn't help that the next book up is Interesting Times, one of the books I dislike the most in the series.


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lokisnow Council Member

lokisnow

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I think you could break it off after the first three-four books, but really I think the stylistic shift happens more dramatically after Moving Pictures. meaning, the first ten books have the similar 'silly parody' style. Starting with Reaper Man, Pratchett begins to move robustly in the character development direction, and the tongue-in-cheek tone starts to fade as the mileau is treated gradually more seriously. The moral questions and dilemmas from Reaper Man onward are also given more heft, Pratchett moves out of the Monty Python tradition after Moving Pictures, so I think that's a better stylistic dividing line than Equal Rites.



Then I'd say there's a third phase, beginning with book 25, The Truth. This is the point where Pratchett really begins to critique and examine modernity in detail. At that point Discworld begins to transition into an industrial revolution, and the overarching theme seems to be 'how we (Earth) got this way' and how much our technology shapes who we are.

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lokisnow Council Member

lokisnow

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so about 70 pages into Raising Steam and it's better than Academicals or the last Vimes book. It's wierd, though, more discursive, at times sort of sprawlingly didactic. Some interstitial scenes seem to be sketches or outlines of scenes that were never severely revised as they probably would be in the past. It's also a four way split in perspective, so far, between the steam inventor, moist, the low king, and vetenari. Lots and lots of exposition so far. otoh, I really like it and am enjoying more than any book since I shall wear midnight. It's more or less a direct sequel to Thud/Making Money, but without Vimes.


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Jussi Council Member

Jussi

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http://www.terrypratchett.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=6317

I JUST had chat with Terry and he writing the next book a Tiffany one and there will be more Discwold ones.

On a sadder note he did say there would be a few more until he died, he was quite stoic about saying that.

Wasn't I Shall Wear Midnight supposed to be the final Tiffany novel?

Ben Aaronovitch reviewed Raising Steam in The Guardian:

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/nov/27/raising-steam-terry-pratchett-review

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