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Dear dear dear. Another thread topic I can't seem to find already covered.

Once again, for shame!

Right, as the title suggests, 'tis a thread for discussing the works of Sir Terry Pratchett.- naturally I expect Discworld will dominate, but it's open to any and all of his works.

I'll kick off.

My favourite character? Toss up between Nanny Ogg, His Grace, The Duke of Ankh, Commander Sir Samuel Vimes and Moist Von Lipwig.

All three have a lot going for them - but I think Nanny Ogg just cinches it. She's pretty much the granny every kid should have, and she's the only person capable of successfully opposing Esme Weatherwax when such things are needed.

So, where is the best place to start? Colour of Magic?

I've never read any Pratchet, but I've often thought I should. I randomly own Guards, Guards and Jingo but neither have ever made their way to the top of my pile.

I enjyed the old Discworld computer game.

I'll admit that I can sometimes be intimidated when met with a huge, sprawly novel series, but I believe the discworld series isn't strictly chronological and within it there are mini-series and stand-alone books?

Could anyone provide a small list of nice entry points?

Things I like in fiction; Maps, Heroes, History, Dargons, Trolls, Intrigue... and spaceships, I suppose.

I like Lord of the Rings, but never been attracted to Game of Thrones (somewhat wierdly given my previous list of fancies). Fantasy authors I enjoy include Tolkien, Tad Williams, Robin Hobb.

Any suggestions?

I should probably read Guards, Guards.

I'd actually say 'Guards! Guards!' is damned good jumping off point.

To my mind, it's the first novel where Discworld was really cemented into what it would become, and of course features The Watch, and therefore Sam Vimes.

The great pleasure in Discworld is that whilst there is an ongoing narrative thread, and character development, you don't need to have read them in order - but doing so adds extra icing to the wonderful pie.

Once read, you'll soon have an idea whether Pratchett appeals

It's funny you started this thread. I'll always have good things about this series and I really want to get into it, but it seems the order of reading is pretty skewed. The best guide I've found is this:

http://io9.gizmodo.com/how-to-read-terry-pratchetts-discworld-series-in-one-h-1567312812

Do you agree? Is there an omnibus version for beginners?

If you want a fixed order, order of release is definitely the way to go. Stuff that happens in one book makes a cameo in others - so whilst it's not a necessity, that's the only one I'd recommend if you wanted a specific order.

No omnibus so far as I'm aware though.

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

My favourite character? Toss up between Nanny Ogg, His Grace, The Duke of Ankh, Commander Sir Samuel Vimes and Moist Von Lipwig.

All three have a lot going for them - but I think Nanny Ogg just cinches it. She's pretty much the granny every kid should have, and she's the only person capable of successfully opposing Esme Weatherwax when such things are needed.

I THINK YOU'RE FORGETTING SOMEONE...

Moist Von Lipwig is a personal favourite, but you just can't top Death. Might have a lot to do with him being voiced by Christopher Lee in the adaptation of Colour of Magic, but still, he's consistently hilarious.

alanmckenzie wrote:So, where is the best place to start? Colour of Magic?

Any suggestions?

I should probably read Guards, Guards.

Colour of Magic is pretty good, but in many ways is purely a parody of a lot of existing fantasy tropes and ideas, the Discworld stories themselves get a lot more coherent and unique later on.

Personally, I'd pick depending on what sort of thing you want to read, they're all so different. The Vimes books (starting with Guards, Guards are detective comedies, the Moist Von Lipwig trilogy (Going Postal, Making Money, Raising Steam) are satires of the postal service, banking and public transport in turn, anything involving Death heavily (such as Mort or Reaper Man) get very meta and deal with the 'big questions' in a very humorous manner.

If you're at all a fan of Shakespeare, Wyrd Sisters is a must, it's Pratchett Does Macbeth and it's brilliant.

But as mentioned, there really is no need to read them in any sort of order, the vast majority are very self-contained or only really reference previous books in the same mini-series. It's not like you have to have read everything to know what's going on.

And if there's parents of young ladies out there, you could do a lot worse than give them the Tiffany Aching books to read

All this talk of Vimes and Witches and Lipwig, bunch of Johnny come lately characters, Rincewind is the first and best.

A sample of why I love Sir Terry and his works? Here's a simple sample quote...

I'd suggest (To get the three "main" groups of characters):

Wyrd Sisters followed by Lords and Ladies

Guards Guards followed by Men at Arms

Mort followed by Reaper Man

This doesn't complete any of the series. Then I'd go back to The Colour of Magic and read straight through in publication order.

And we've got this handy-dandy reading order guide-onna-stick!



I'm currently working on replacing my paperback collection with the Discworld Emporium's Library collection of hardcovers.

 Mozzyfuzzy wrote:
All this talk of Vimes and Witches and Lipwig, bunch of Johnny come lately characters, Rincewind is the first and best.

Talking of Johnny, there are the Johnny and the Dead, and such.
I have to go back and read them, as Discworld usually jumps out at my when I go back to the Pratchett shelf.
IMHO, The Colour of Magic and The Light Fantastic are the worst of Pratchett's books. They may be the places a lot of people start, but I don't like that style much. I started with Mort, went back to Equal Rites, Pyramids, and back further to TCoM and TLF, and kept going as more books were written. I am glad I did it this way, as I'd probably not have tried beyond the first two.

For people just starting with Discworld, it might be worth looking at the themes the reading guides mention. Some books are detective stories (Guards Guards and the Vimes books), Death (Mort), the witches (Equal Rites), the wizards (Eric) and lots of semi-standalone like Jingo and Small Gods. I would say to look at the styles and start at the beginning of one of them. Go back and fill in the gaps later.

Also, Good Omens is the best book he ever (co)wrote.

 Graphite wrote:
Also, Good Omens is the best book he ever (co)wrote.

Which got me reading Gaiman's other stuff. Stardust and Neverwhere, mostly.

Good Omens (Or The Nice And Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch) really is a superb read as well.

The more I think about it, the more I can't recall a Pratchett novel I haven't enjoyed.

For much younger readers, bedtime stories can be found in 'The Dragons At Crumbling Castle'

And more quotey goodness of the sort of mind you'll be delving into....

Good Omens, on the demise of Agnes Nutter wrote:Agnes was burned at the stake by a mob; however, because she had foreseen her fiery end and had packed 80 pounds of gunpowder and 40 pounds of roofing nails into her petticoats, everyone who participated in the burning was killed instantly.

Don't read Raising Steam, its quite a tragic book. not because of its content but because of its poor quality. He was very obviously not as his best when he wrote that book.

I think my favourite book is probably the Fifth Elephant.

 Silent Puffin? wrote:
Don't read Raising Steam, its quite a tragic book. not because of its content but because of its poor quality. He was very obviously not as his best when he wrote that book.

I think my favourite book is probably the Fifth Elephant.

To be fair. He was suffering from Alzheimer's by that point and it was the last book he finished before he died.

 welshhoppo wrote:

To be fair. He was suffering from Alzheimer's by that point and it was the last book he finished before he died.

That was exactly my point.

I quite liked Raising Steam. The characterisation and dialogue wasn't quite right, but I liked the plot. The imagery of the train lines heading off into mysterious places that everyone thought had been abandoned by the setting - Ohulan Cutash, the forest of Skund, etc - worked for me. Kinda reminded me of bits of China Miéville's Iron Council.

I second the "read 'em in the order they came out". It's not just following the continuity or the running jokes (You need to read The Light Fantastic to find out why everyone thinks "edritch" means "oblong"), but you can follow the evolution of his writing style and how he thinks about the Discworld and how it reflects the real world.

Shepherds Crown is his last Discworld, not Raising Steam

For anyone still considering, I'd describe Pratchett's sensibilities as equal parts silly, scathing and insightful - but always warm hearted.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
I'd actually say 'Guards! Guards!' is damned good jumping off point.

To my mind, it's the first novel where Discworld was really cemented into what it would become, and of course features The Watch, and therefore Sam Vimes.

The great pleasure in Discworld is that whilst there is an ongoing narrative thread, and character development, you don't need to have read them in order - but doing so adds extra icing to the wonderful pie.

Once read, you'll soon have an idea whether Pratchett appeals

Seconded! That book was given to me by a forum member and was the first Pratchett book I ever read. Ive since read 10 I think and only didnt care for 1 of those. His discworld books are just entertaining reads.

I bought guards a year ago and have yet to get around to reading yet, but I've heard nothing but good things. It's a good one to start with yes?

Definitely.

As mentioned it's probably the first book to really set Discworld out - and he really finds his feet with his own style.

The very earliest, whilst entertaining reads in their own right, don't yet show or embody what made the series truly great. Again as mentioned they're more a generic sending up of Fantasy tropes.

And now for some possible Apocrypha....Constable Carrot Ironfounderson came about when Sir Terry visited a LARP, and met a 6' tall Dwarf....

The first discworld book I read many moons ago back in 97 was reaper man. God I laughed my head off so much, had a few strange looks for sure.
I prefer the early books with death myself but like the last poster said there's only one I didn't really care for that much and that was monstrous regiment.
Oh and who was expecting the little dog to pull the rubber toy out of the cupboard in making money!!! Lol well I think it was making money .

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Shepherds Crown is his last Discworld, not Raising Steam .

Shepherd's Crown was also very clearly not actually finished when he died - His daughter says as much in the intro. Both books really suffered from the lack of his usual polish, although part of my disappointment with Shepherd's Crown was self-inflicted... In my head, I had (completely unintentionally) built an expectation that it was going to be awesome since it was the last Pratchett book ever... and it just wasn't.




While a lot of the Discworld books stand quite well on their own, I recommend going with the publishing order. So many of the stories link into each other, and both the universe and Pratchett's writing evolve so much over the course of the series that it's a bit weird if you just back and forth.


Outside of the Discworld, my favourite of his books was Nation. I think the only book that has ever made me laugh and cry as much as that book did was the Wee Free Men.

I read the first...9, 10 or 11 or so?

But then everything felt very...samey.

I might have to give this another go.

I think my favourite Discworld novel is Monstrous Regiment, it doesn't really fit in anywhere overall but has a great Vimes cameo and I just adore the way it is written. To me it is one of the greatest anti war treatises ever written. I love Pyramids, Small Gods and any of the Watch based novels with Feet of Clay and Night Watch being my favourites. You just cannot beat Vimes/Carrot/Angus/ Nobby et al as an excellent ensemble of characters.

Then again I have a soft spot for the Witch basednovels as well. So basically go and read all of them.

Unseen Academicals was pretty rubbish - but then again I don't like football. Snuff was both fairly poor and quite unpleasant. Raising Steam was a big improvement.

But these are the last 3 novels. Pretty well everything prior to then is varying levels of genius.

I enjoyed Unseen Academicals - it was also the first Discworld I'd read in a long old time.

Compared to others in the series it was a bit of a slog, but I really took to Mr Knutt as a character. It's a shame we never saw him again :(

I was first introduced to Discworld via the Soul music and Wyrd sisters cartoon adaptions. Since seeing those, many, many years ago; I have read many of the books and have all the TV movies[I'm annoyed Mr Grevousbodilyharmsworth was left out of the 'Going postal' movie].
I tried reading the more recent books but I couldn't stomach them. They were too similar.