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Of all the sub-series in Discworld I probably enjoy the witches the least, as other have mentioned this may well be due to starting with Equal Rights. The Tiffany books are good though, but mostly for the Feegles.
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Mar 1, 2014 00:03
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The feegles are brilliant, they're easily my favorite characters in his books. I wish I Shall Wear Midnight had done more with Amber, she was hilarious. On the topic of ISWM I finished it and liked it overall, but it makes me sad as the last of the Tiffany Aching novels... the ending felt rushed and somewhat lame, and I thought he wasted a great setup vis-a-vis Tiffany's being overworked, struggling with all the horrible poo poo she had to see, and just generally not doing the kid to adult transition that great... seeing her solve her problems with love and magic was frustrating.
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Mar 2, 2014 01:32
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I also feel like we should be seeing a bit more of Tiffany and also Agnes. It's a shame that Agnes was really only in two books and most of them saw her as a walking fat joke, loveless despite Lancre's alleged love for big-boned women. I just feel that we should see more Agnes and more... care taken with her character, I guess.
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Mar 2, 2014 05:19
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:I think it's also that Granny needs the other witches as foils to really work well. Nanny Ogg and Magrat help define what Granny *isn't*. Yeah, Tiffany Works as a stand-alone character, but Granny really needs to be part of a triumvirate. Without Nanny and Magrat she's just a straight-man with nobody to bounce off of.
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Mar 2, 2014 05:55
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Pidmon posted:I also feel like we should be seeing a bit more of Tiffany and also Agnes. It's a shame that Agnes was really only in two books and most of them saw her as a walking fat joke, loveless despite Lancre's alleged love for big-boned women. I always felt that was more to do with how Agnes saw herself rather than the rest of Lancre, in physical terms at least. Agnes is a big-boned woman who hated being big-boned, she never came to accept herself which let's be honest would have been especially hard since her magical talent literally gave life to all those doubts and turned them into a literal sniping little voice in her head constantly judging her. She was also a dreamer, "A Lancre farmer needed a wife who would think nothing of beating a wolf to death with her apron when she went out to get some firewood" gives the impression that Lancre, when it comes to marriage, values practicality more than dreaming, so a girl who likes to wander about singing foreign songs isn't going to be as appealing to them and that was before she became a witch. She's also not entirely loveless, in Carpe Jugulum she was pursued by a smitten vampire after all and at the end it looks as though she's found someone both she and Perdita can love. Also as far as I can recall the only ones to make an issue of her weight were people in Ankh-Morpork, the vampires, and Agnes/Perdita but it has been a while since I reread those books, I do admit though I would have liked to have seen more done with Agnes.
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Mar 2, 2014 12:27
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Agnes got unlucky in that she joined the Witches late in Granny's development, when Pratchett was almost done with the character as a lead. As a result Agnes doesn't really get a chance to finish her arc with the Witches, and since she isn't really a good fit for being a main protagonist, at least in one of Pratchett's books, she sort of just got left by the wayside. It is odd that she's literally never mentioned again. Even Mightily Oats gets a minor callback in I Shall Wear Midnight.
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Mar 2, 2014 12:49
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Pidmon posted:I also feel like we should be seeing a bit more of Tiffany and also Agnes. It's a shame that Agnes was really only in two books and most of them saw her as a walking fat joke, loveless despite Lancre's alleged love for big-boned women. Three books. She first appears in Lords and Ladies as a supporting character before becoming a main character in Maskerade and arguably the lead character in Carpe Jugulum. And her arc is pretty much complete: her role is to replace Granny in the trifecta, which is no longer balanced once Magrat becomes a mother.
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Mar 2, 2014 15:01
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So I just finished Raising Steam, and I have to say, it's not as bad as I was expecting, based on comments from this thread, but it ultimately felt rushed. Like someone took Going Postal, Thud, a one-off "innovation" book like The Truth or Moving Pictures but with Trains, and then mashed it all together into one book, interspersed with really, really awkward Ventinari monologues where he bashes you over the head with infodumps about what he's thinking in lieu of natural character development. A lot of previous books have things happening offscreen, but this one made it feel like nothing happened that we weren't immediately aware of, and we just jumped from event to event with no downtime ever. Also some of the jokes made me laugh, but a lot of the other ones were hamhanded in the extreme and felt out of place for the sections they were in. Serious dialog, serious dialog, fat pun, serious dialog, miner/minor pun, serious dialog. And with that last one, the only time I can recall Pterry doing a fully-homophone pun was the profit/prophet joke that was immediately lampshaded. Having that in dialog and being un-remarked upon felt really odd.
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Mar 5, 2014 22:02
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Ursine Asylum posted:So I just finished Raising Steam, and I have to say, it's not as bad as I was expecting, based on comments from this thread, but it ultimately felt rushed. Like someone took Going Postal, Thud, a one-off "innovation" book like The Truth or Moving Pictures but with Trains, and then mashed it all together into one book, interspersed with really, really awkward Ventinari monologues where he bashes you over the head with infodumps about what he's thinking in lieu of natural character development. A lot of previous books have things happening offscreen, but this one made it feel like nothing happened that we weren't immediately aware of, and we just jumped from event to event with no downtime ever. The "arms of Morpheus" bit at the start threw me a bit. I don't think Morpheus has ever been mentioned in the Discworld before. I was also slightly disappointed because I was under the impression that it was going to be the London underground, but in Ankh-Morpork, but that's my own fault for not paying attention.
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Mar 5, 2014 23:29
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Gambrinus posted:The "arms of Morpheus" bit at the start threw me a bit. I don't think Morpheus has ever been mentioned in the Discworld before. Also quote:I was also slightly disappointed because I was under the impression that it was going to be the London underground, but in Ankh-Morpork, but that's my own fault for not paying attention. That was definitely an unfired plot gun there; between the end of...Thud? with The Undertaking (which for some reason is never mentioned), and even in this book with the mention of the goblins making their own underground railroad. I was expecting that to be a critical point for the climax, but I guess not.
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Mar 5, 2014 23:53
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I suppose the trains were invented before the underground was. I suppose it could be room after the invention of the train to move onto the underground. To be totally honest though I don't think London Underground is sufficently funny enough for its own plot, so really should have been included in raising steam. I think this thread over the last few pages sort of highlights the difference in jokes in the latest books. The comment that was confused about the pun on Roman household gods and "what's that when it's at home" is a great example of an early Pratchett joke that makes you groan inwardly when you get it but also secretly laugh too because it was a subtle bad joke. In the newer novels you tend not to get a joke you may have to read 4 times before you see it. I remember reading something like Men At Arms or something similar in terms of its one of the older books. I must have read it like 10 times before reading it again and yet I found a really terrible pun joke I had missed all the times I had read it before. I liked that a lot.
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Mar 7, 2014 01:58
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Honestly, when Raising Steam was first announced I was expecting it to be about the establishment of an underground metro system, given all the hints that have been dropped about it in previous books. Plus it felt to me like there was more fertile ground for humour in that than just in cross-country trains.
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Mar 7, 2014 07:10
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Raising Steam probably WAS conceived as part of that underground, but Pratchett likely wanted to get out of Ankh-Morpork for a bit so he had it across the continent. Notice how the last 1/3 of the story is pretty contrived as an excuse to make it happen outside of the city.
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Mar 7, 2014 07:20
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I suppose it may come up in one of the ten new books he's supposedly working on.
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Mar 7, 2014 11:51
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I started with Interesting Times, myself, I was bored in study hall one day with nothing much to study, and there among all this dull-looking literature on the English room's shelf was this bright orange-and-purple 90's-rear end paperback that grabbed my attention. After that I read Men At Arms and I was hooked for good. I think Interesting Times wasn't too terrible of an introduction to the series but it does make some direct callbacks to Color of Magic and Light Fantastic and so if you do read it before the original pair, accept that everything Twoflower wrote in his little tract about how interesting foreign parts are is true, for a given value of true, no matter how much Rincewind protests that he had nothing to do with it. Irisi posted:And the comedy value of Nanny, Granny and Magrat together is just through the roof. The part of Wyrd Sisters where the increasingly unhinged Hamlet/Macbeth play is carried out with them on stage as the Three Witches never fails to make me wail with laughter. Nothing wrong with that yuck, exactly the right kind of yuck for this scene.
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Mar 22, 2014 20:45
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When everything just comes together towards the end of Wyrd Sisters is all gold really.
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Mar 22, 2014 22:18
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Skippy McPants posted:It is odd that she's literally never mentioned again. Even Mightily Oats gets a minor callback in I Shall Wear Midnight. Oats is also in Science of Discworld IV, and is horrible like the rest of that book.
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Mar 23, 2014 14:43
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Grabbed me some fine Discworld swag this morning: It's a legit 1994 Discworld concept album written and performed by old prog rocker Dave Greenslade(with narration by Tony Robinson). I also found the soundtrack CD for the Soul Music cartoon in the same shop, which I mainly picked up out of curiosity, as I can't really remember what any of the songs sounded like.
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Mar 24, 2014 16:36
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Lucky Devil, that music is brilliant.
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Mar 24, 2014 17:32
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Castle Radium posted:Grabbed me some fine Discworld swag this morning: The Soul Music songs are pretty decent homages.
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Mar 24, 2014 18:17
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Dr. Buttass posted:I started with Interesting Times, myself, I was bored in study hall one day with nothing much to study, and there among all this dull-looking literature on the English room's shelf was this bright orange-and-purple 90's-rear end paperback that grabbed my attention. After that I read Men At Arms and I was hooked for good. Interesting Times is great since it has Cohen in it. And the Luggage. And maybe for having Rincewind in it.
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Mar 27, 2014 12:29
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I'm really struggling to read raising steam. It's bordering on just being ... bad.
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Apr 8, 2014 22:25
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I couldn't get more than halfway through Unseen Academicals and I never read Snuff because Vimes is my favorite Discworld character and I didn't want to read a mediocre story about him, but Raising Steam is ok so far about 1/3 of the way in. Moist isn't as interesting as he was in his previous books, but for the first Pratchett book I've read in several years it's certainly not as disappointing as it could be.
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Apr 9, 2014 00:23
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One big issue with Raising Steam is that the antagonists are really weak, you never think they are going to win or even pose a serious challenge. Vetinari, Moist, and Vimes have gone through so much that it's hard to think up of a new challenge for any of them. Before, even though Vetinari ran the city, they were fighting against traditional rules and customs that were there long before Vetinari was. In Raising Steam, you get the sense that Vetinari has truly remade the city in his image and they are only fighting against a comparatively weak group of reactionaries that have to resort to terrorism and coups. I think it might be time to step away from Ankh-Moprork for a while, or maybe have one more book that deals with Vetinari's resignation or natural death.
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Apr 10, 2014 23:04
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Konstantin posted:[..]maybe have one more book that deals with Vetinari's resignation or natural death. I honestly hope that when Pratchett stops writing Discworld, he doesn't try to "wrap up" any characters or plotlines, like for example by killing Vimes or Vetinari. I'd like to imagine they'd just keep on ticking, even after Pratchett has stopped writing (or really dictating his stories...). No need for a true ending.
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Apr 11, 2014 10:15
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Iacen posted:I honestly hope that when Pratchett stops writing Discworld, he doesn't try to "wrap up" any characters or plotlines, like for example by killing Vimes or Vetinari.
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Apr 11, 2014 16:54
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FactsAreUseless posted:Agreed, Vimes should have his brain put in a golem and Vetinari should become a vampire. Feet of Clay all over again. Half man. Half golem. All watchman.
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Apr 11, 2014 18:04
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I'm again confused. Why is Vimes so resentful of the title of duke at the end of Jingo, and what does the Patrician buy with it? It felt like it was a reward for participating in stopping a war, and I didn't get the sentiments at all.
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Apr 12, 2014 19:24
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Vimes has... an issue... with authority figures. His change into one, as the series goes on, is discomforting for him and he fights it every step of the way.
Silento fucked around with this message at 20:32 on Apr 12, 2014 |
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Apr 12, 2014 20:29
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Okay. But what's the Patrician's angle (or as Vimes sees it)?
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Apr 12, 2014 20:57
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supermikhail posted:Okay. But what's the Patrician's angle (or as Vimes sees it)? As Vimes sees it, Vetenari is a dick. As Vetenari sees it, he gains a useful member of the nobility who can be dispatched around the place, be respected due to his title, and still function if not as a spy at least as an agent of change.
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Apr 12, 2014 21:04
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supermikhail posted:Okay. But what's the Patrician's angle (or as Vimes sees it)? It turns Vimes into, symbolically, Ankh-Morpork itself. Notice that Vetinari sends Vimes around on diplomatic missions as the Duke. Vetinari wants the rule of law (applying to everyone else) and sentient rights implemented, and Vimes is his tool to do it. Every time Vimes does something awesome and gets promoted again he becomes more useful as an instrument of policy. He's been promoted over the heads of the nobility too, he hasn't thrown it around too much but he's the authority in Ankh-Morpork behind only Vetinari. He doesn't need to become Patrician after Vetinari retires, he's not suited for the job in any way but he'll be there keeping the next one honest.
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Apr 12, 2014 21:08
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Well, Vetinari is a cool dick. ...That could have been said better. He's certainly a clever jerk. Anyway, in my reality there haven't been any diplomatic missions as Duke yet, as Jingo is as far as I've gotten right now. (Not that I have gone completely unspoiled up to now.) And not that I complaining. That's spoilers I'm now looking forward to.
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Apr 12, 2014 21:38
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Vimes' social ascension, and the results thereof, are basically an illustration of one of the basic principles of the social rules of thermodynamics; specifically, the kind of man who would seek a position of power is the kind of man you should never allow to attain it, and therefore if you want an honest authority, you must force it on a man who doesn't want it.
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Apr 13, 2014 11:04
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Vetinari's whole "thing" is making the city work and part of that is the rule of law to which everyone is subject. Some of the "law" is pretty out there from our point of view, like it being totally ok for the Assassins to
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Apr 13, 2014 11:31
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Plus Vimes works best when he is angry and people referring to him as 'your grace' all the time is a good way to keep him wound up.
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Apr 13, 2014 12:37
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What did people think about Dodger, Pratchett's YA book about Dickens-era London? I quite enjoyed it - all the historical cameos were clever and not too cute, and the story itself was pretty good. I also feel like he set it up for a sequel or maybe even a series.
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Apr 13, 2014 17:22
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supermikhail posted:Well, Vetinari is a cool dick. He goes on a couple through the rest of the series. And yes, Dodger is a good book. I'd happily read more, but I'll accept it as well wrapped-up where it ended.
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Apr 13, 2014 18:20
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Man, you know, I'd really like to see a smaller stakes Watch Book. It seems like pretty every one is about a big threat to AM, or a huge change on the Disc. I'll like just a standard murder mystery that isn't going to result in the disc being changed completely by it. I guess what I want is an 87th precinct story set in AM. Which is what the tv series isn't it? Assuming it isn't dead.
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Apr 14, 2014 20:12
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Chamberk posted:What did people think about Dodger, Pratchett's YA book about Dickens-era London? I quite enjoyed it - all the historical cameos were clever and not too cute, and the story itself was pretty good. I also feel like he set it up for a sequel or maybe even a series. I wasn't wowed. It was OK, but I... just kept expecting more. It feels like it could have been a Discworld book four or five books from now and been better for it.
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Apr 14, 2014 21:29
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