Pratchett, Terry - Mort (reread)

[oyceter]

(Apologies for spamming! Um, yes, I am trying to catch up with my backlog, so there may be a few more...)

I actually haven't read very much Terry Pratchett at all. The first time I read this, I was mildly amused but not too impressed. I suspect for most things intended to be funny, I have to read them a few times. Otherwise, the prose strikes me as too twee or too contrived.

Mort is all elbows and thinks entirely too much for his small village, which is how he ends up at a fair for people trying to find apprentices. Fortunately (?) for Mort, Death of Discworld is looking for an apprentice.

Mort gets himself into a giant scrape involving the very fabric of reality, and antics ensue.

I enjoyed this the second time around, now that I had a better feel for Pratchett's sense of humor. I love the long footnotes, though I got sick of a few of them closer to the end of the book. I also like the characters a lot more; the first time I read it, I couldn't quite figure out how sympathetic I was supposed to feel and how much Pratchett was making fun of them. I think I rather like the gentle fun he pokes; I had originally read them with the vague idea that he wrote satire and not good story (this was pre-LJ).

My favorite character was Ysabell, even though she didn't get many pages; I am a sucker for overlooked girls who prove to be useful and down-to-earth.

I could tell from vague knowledge collected from LJ that Pratchett was bringing Mort to meet several established Discworld characters, but since I don't know any of them outside of Granny Weatherwax, it had very little impression on me.

So: I think I am going to try and read up on Pratchett, just to keep up with LJ, if nothing else. Also, he won me over in another book with SQUEAK! from the Death of rats.

I definitely like the Death books, so I think that is Soul Music and Hogsfather. Mely and Rachel both say to avoid Rincewind and to read the Guards books. Rec me! Also, let me know if I should read in any particular order!

Of the Discworld books, I have read: this book, The Amazing Maurice and The Color of Magic (was not terribly impressed by the last, but Mely says it is because it sucks).

Comments

[telophase.livejournal.com]

If you haven't read Reaper Man, it's the Death book where the Death of Rats is introduced.

The Guards series starts with Guards! Guards!, then Men at Arms, then Feet of Clay, then Jingo, then The Fifth Elephant, then Night Watch, then Thud!

Recommended reading order guides: http://www.lspace.org/books/reading-order-guides/

[oyceter]

Awesome, thanks!

Why yes, I am too lazy to do a quick Google...

Also, OMG! Introduction of Death of Rats! Am so reading that one.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

I'm one of those people who loves Reaper Man. I think I read somewhere that Pratchett said it's invariable Americans who love RM, while Brits tend to prefer Small Gods.

[kate_nepveu]

Apparently I am secretly a Brit. Who knew?

[cofax7]

I am apparently British as well; I adored Small Gods. ::makes a note to buy and reread::

[ckd]

I like both. Clearly, this means I am a dual citizen. (Which I am, but the other one is Ireland instead of the UK. Close enough, I guess.)

[shewhohashope.livejournal.com]

Apparently I'm American. I liked Small Gods, but the anti-organised-religion theme was a bit heavy for me.

[slrose.livejournal.com]

The Guards books are my favorites. Men At Arms is the one that hooked me. [Police procedural. In ridiculous fantasy world.]

My other favorite is The Wee Free Men.

The Colour of Magic was his first book. He got better.

[oyceter]

Gotcha, thanks!

[tatterpunk.livejournal.com]

The Death-centric books are (in chronological order): Mort, Reaper Man, Soul Music, Hogfather, and Thief of Time. Or really, the Death/Susan books, but I count his family as a unit. They're the only Discworld novels I can muster up any real enthusiasm for as well (and I think they get considerably better after Mort) -- I read Masquerade and started a few others I couldn't finish. But I've heard his send-up of vampires in Carpe Jugulum is also worth reading, if you're interested in that sort of thing.

[oyceter]

Y'know, after just finishing Twilight, I think a vampire send-off would be just the thing.

[rachelmanija.livejournal.com]

The Color of Magic is terrible. The first few Discworld books are pretty bad, and anything with Rincewind (whom he seems to have dropped as a character) is highly skippable.

The thing with Pratchett is that he gets better as he goes along, so the beginnings of some arcs are a bit weak. The Vimes/Guards books do benefit from being read in order, though. Um. I forget which one is the first.

My favorites are the Vimes/Guards books, the YA books (Maurice and Tiffany Aching), the Granny Weatherwax books, the Death books, and some of the stand-alones... which is everything but the Rincewind books, some of the early stand-alones, and some of the Susan books, I realize.

Soul Music is entertaining but slight. I love Hogfather, and that would be a good choice to read next because it's a Death book. The Unseen University cracks me up, but I forget which ones it features.

Of the stand-alones, Going Postal and The Truth are both excellent but thematically and narratively similar, so I wouldn't read them in close succession. Small Gods is excellent but more predictable.

Pratchett has quite a few practical girls and women. They're most featured in the Granny Weatherwax, Tiffany Aching, and Susan books, and in Monstrous Regiment. There's several in the Guards, too.

[cofax7]

Monstrous Regiment was the only one of the recent Pratchetts that I really didn't like. IIRC, I found it preachy and predictable. (I suspect gender issues are not Pratchett's forte, although he does wonderfully with the Granny books.)

[rachelmanija.livejournal.com]

It was still way better than Equal Rites, his awful first try at the same subject. I give it points for the hilarious early bit about the insane God who kept banning random items, like pants and the color blue.

Note to Oyce: It's not that Pratchett is anti-feminist, but that when he writes about feminist issues head-on, he can get overly enthusiastic in a way which isn't well-integrated with the story-telling.

Jingo also seemed preachy (and too long), though the bit with Vimes' future-predicting dayplanner was genius. And I just didn't like The Thief of Time.

With those exceptions, I've really liked most of his recent books.

[oyceter]

Ahhh, got it. B/c so far I have liked his women (ok, Ysabell and the princess who's name I forgot).

[telophase.livejournal.com]

The monk Brother Soto in Thief of Time? puppleball's husband. :) Pratchett let us auction off a character in one of his books for a charity auction I ran at Aggiecon the year he was a guest there, and puppleball's husband won it. (And he only spent half the money he'd set aside for it - I know how much he'd budgeted. XD)

The hair? REAL.

[oyceter]

Really? That is awesome! I will have to remember that when I read it!

[telophase.livejournal.com]

And remember that I picked Terry Pratchett up from the Houston airport that convention. :D

[minim_calibre]

I loved it, but it hit EVERY one of my Girls Rule buttons and made me wax nostalgic for my favorite children's tales of the sort.

[oyceter]

Oooh, ok, thanks!

[fresne.livejournal.com]

Hogsfather is one of my favorites. As with a number of Pratchett's later works it starts out being amusing and ends up in this sort of paen of poetic musing on the nature of (insert poetic musing here). In this case, perception and how perception informs reality.

All of the Death centric stories are amusing to very good.

Wyrd Sisters was one of the funniest parodies of MacBeth/Hamlet I've ever read.

I will say, sometimes I enjoy his one off Discworld books (too numerous to list) and sometimes I find them a little too... too... and "here is the message" arch. And thus the library is a friend to sort the twain in two.

[oyceter]

Oh huh. I kept feeling like I was missing something with Mort, like it was supposed to be more poignant than it was? I mean, I liked Death's ventures into the world of humanity, but it didn't particularly touch me.

Hrm. Now Wyrd Sisters sounds familiar. Maybe I did read it a long time ago and just forgot.

[fresne.livejournal.com]

Well, at in Reaper Man, referring to a previous post of yours re: vampires/teenagers, there’s a quasi romance between Death, posing as an itinerant farmhand, and a cranky little old lady. It's like all those romance novels set in the lonely prairie and... not.

[oyceter]

Ok, that is awesome! That AND the Death of Rats!

[sarahtales.livejournal.com]

I really like the Guards series, they start with Guards, Guards and I think you'll enjoy Lady Ramkin. If you want a standalone my vote is for Going Postal - though actually the follow-on to that is being published in October, to my great joy because I thought it had the best romance I've ever seen from Pratchett. (I did like the choice of Ysabell, but we see little of the actual romance.)

Mely is right about Colour of Magic. Just keep going from Mort is my advive - I enjoy the witches books also, they start with Wyrd Sisters, which is very much Pratchett Does Macbeth and fun. Try it out! Try them all out. It's lovely to have an author as consistently good as Pratchett turning out regular books, it makes me happy.

[oyceter]

Ok! I will use Mort's publication date as a rough guideline.

[rachelmanija.livejournal.com]

Umm. I would skip Pyramids and Moving Pictures. They're both completely forgettable.

[oyceter]

Ok! Will remember that.

[theodosia.livejournal.com]

But Pyramids has an absolutely spot-on parody of Tom Brown's Schooldays set in the Assassin's Guild school. And then the pyramid architects have to invent calculus to keep up with the building which gets... complicated.

It's from early in this career, but it shows you where he's going, IMHO.

[oyceter]

Hrm. Possibly I will skip until I am sure I like him, just in case I am put off by it, and may read only after I know what Tom Brown's Schooldays are (I am guessing popular book series from the past maybe?).

[rilina.livejournal.com]

I like the Granny Weatherwax and Death/Susan books; I've never been able to muster any real enthusiasm for the Guards books, and I hated The Colour of Magic too.

I skipped the first Granny Weatherwax book, by the way, and it doesn't seem to have done me any harm. Wyrd Sisters is just great.

[oyceter]

Ooo ok. I'm now wondering if I read Wyrd Sisters and forgot; the Macbeth plot sounds vaguely familiar.

The only thing I remember out of the one (or two) witch book I read was three witches, one of whom was pretty and new age-y and somewhat looked down on by Granny Weatherwax.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

I also really dislike the Rincewind books and agree that you don't need to read them.

Some of my favorites are:
Small Gods (a stand-alone, about the Discworld's version of the Spanish Inquisition)
Hogfather (a Death book about Christmas)
Reaper Man (a Death book about Death deciding to quit his job)
Witches Abroad (a witch book about fairy tales)
Lords and Ladies (a witch book about Macbeth)
Men at Arms (a Guard book about gun control and King Arthur)
Masquerade (a witch book about the Phantom of the Opera)
Thud! (a Guard book about race relations)

I also thought The Night Watch was *really* excellent, but unlike most of the series, you needed to be familiar with the characters and previous events for it to work.

That turned out to be a really long list, but I *adore* Terry Pratchett.

[oyceter]

Oh, thank you for writing those out!

Also, dude! Book on race relations, awesome!

[rachelmanija.livejournal.com]

That's the one I was reading in Taiwan, that I said you would probably like but you had to read the previous ones first. The Guards books deal a lot with race relations and prejudice, as the Guards (police) deal with a more pluralistic society, and must themselves (sometimes forcibly) accept members of races, species, genders, etc which they've never had to before. Feet of Clay, an earlier Guards book, is about the exploitation of a particular group of beings, and involves Jewish mythology.

And they're very funny! And sometimes spooky, poetic, and magical.

[oyceter]

Oh! Cool!

Also, Jewish mythology! Even better!

[jinian.livejournal.com]

I'm rarely in the mood for Pratchett, but I really like Hogfather, and of course the Death of Rats is wonderful.

Did you know there are animations of a couple of Discworld novels? They're very good.

[oyceter]

There are animations? Like... animated shorts? Or...

Huh I can't think of anything else.

(is it too much to hope for an animated Death of Rats?)

[telophase.livejournal.com]

Not shorts, but three-episode series, IIRC. (I used to own bootleg VHS tapes of them.) Wyrd Sisters was one, and the other was ... forgettable, apparently.

There is also a live-action version of Hogfather that was aired as a 2-part miniseries on the BBC this past winter, which I have, er, acquired, and once you read the book, let me know and the DVD Fairy may pay you a visit.

It has the Death of Rats in it.

[jinian.livejournal.com]

I remember Wyrd Sisters better too. The other one appears to be Soul Music (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0159914/).

I so want to see the live-action Hogfather!

[oyceter]

Awesome! I will!

[shewhohashope.livejournal.com]

It doesn't really seem like you need any more recommendations, but:

City Watch books:

Guards! Guards! (most re-read), Men at Arms, Feet of Clay (this is the weakest, but it's still worth a look), Jingo, Fifth Elephant, Night Watch (Possibly the best of the lot), and then they proceed to mentioned in quite a few books, but Thud! is the last official Watch book (anti-war, kinda preachy).

They really suffer from not being read in order. I read Jingo, and then Men at Arms, and it almost ruined Guards! Guards! for me

Witches books:

Equal Rites (skip it), Wyrd Sisters (It's like MacBeth, but fun!), Witches abroad (fabulous fairy tale parody), Lords and Ladies (my favourite! Mythology, mostly elves and Faery), Maskerade (Phantom of the Opera and Opera in general, you could skip it entirely imo), Carpe Jugulum (Vampire send up)

The Tiffany Aching books:

Wee Free Men, Hatful of Sky, Wintersmith

All equally fantastic. Add Tiffany to your list of practical women/girls.

Death/Susan

Mort, Reaper Man (This is the best! Death of Rats, Death working on a farm, spoiler, spoiler, spoiler.), Soul Music, Hogfather, Thief of Time

I don't really like Susan. I wish he'd kept Ysabell.

You can skip Rincewind. It' not that I don't like him, he's just extraordinarily boring compared to just about every other Discworld character.

Stand Alones of Note:

Pyramids was the first Discworld book I read, and it's much funnier after reading 'Tom Brown's schooldays' and it's nice to get out of Ankh-Mopork every now and then.

The Truth Free press in Discworld, what's not love. I hope this continues as a series.

Going Postal No longer a stand-alone, since Making Money is coming out this year. But it's pretty easy to get into with little to no previous Discworld knowledge. The lead character's name is Moist, and not a lot is made of it.

Small Gods everyone else loves it. I was put off because although it's based on the Spanish inquisition to an extent, the explicit othering of the barbaric religion got to me.

Look here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discworld#Lists_of_Novels) for a more comprehensive list of what all the novels are about.

[oyceter]

Oh, this is awesome, thank you!!

[chomiji]

I love Pratchett, but his earliest books suck big time. The Color of Magic and the other Rincewind books are awfully lame - although I do like The Luggage.

Hogfather is one of my favorite books in the world, and I do really like Susan (although I could have done without A Thief of Time). I am also very fond of Monstrous Regiment: yes, he gets a little heavy-handed, but so much of it is hilarious. He turns every "she followed her soldier boy" trope there is inside out and backward, with wonderful results.

The Guards books are probably the best of the others. Sam Vimes, Carrot, and Angua are all wonderful characters. I like some of the issues raised in Feet of Clay, which is rarely mentioned.

And The Wee Free Men deserves every accolade it's received, although the sequels are just pleasant, nothing more.

[oyceter]

Oh, cool! The Wee Free Men hadn't really been on my radar before, but now it definitely is.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

Monstrous Regiment is one of my comfort reads - I'm a character person and there's something about the characters that really hooks me. I don't know what or why.

[keilexandra]

I haven't read much Pratchett--only his YA witch series, and a few Discworld--but I always recommend SMALL GODS. So... I recommend it. ;)

[oyceter]

Awesome, thanks!