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daggerdragon
Jan 22, 2006

My titan engine can kick your titan engine's ass.

ConfusedUs posted:

I picked up half a dozen Discworld books for fifty cents each.

WTF HOW WHERE?!?!

Oh, and Rincewind pisses me off with his utter pussyness.

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ConfusedUs
Feb 24, 2004

Bees?
You want fucking bees?
Here you go!
ROLL INITIATIVE!!





daggerdragon posted:

WTF HOW WHERE?!?!

YMCA thrift store. The one in Blacksburg, VA is a veritable gold mine of excellent reading material.

Sionak
Dec 20, 2005

Mind flay the gap.
Thrift stores in general are great places to find used books, including Pratchett. I've seen several Discworld books for 50 cents at the local Goodwill, and I picked up a hardcover of Thud! for a dollar last week.

Some libraries have used book sales, too. The books are usually old copies or donations, and go for very cheap.

Krinkle
Feb 9, 2003

Ah do believe Ah've got the vapors...
Ah mean the farts


Just finished rereading men at arms. What did vetinari mean about "politician"? I'm looking it up on dictionary.com but it keeps linking to other words. Does it mean "guy who personifies the city" or "city boss" or something? Word origins should be easier to find than this.

Where policeman means man of the city, I just want a phrase like that to wrap it up. I remember looking in vain last time for answers, too.

Edit: Also this book gives incredible blue balls because it is lacking one final scene where cuddy gets the ghost of the gonne and makes some army of darkness references or something, finally agreeing to accompany death to the afterlife

Krinkle fucked around with this message at 04:35 on Sep 12, 2007

withak
Jan 15, 2003


Fun Shoe

Krinkle posted:

Just finished rereading men at arms. What did vetinari mean about "politician"? I'm looking it up on dictionary.com but it keeps linking to other words. Does it mean "guy who personifies the city" or "city boss" or something? Word origins should be easier to find than this.

Where policeman means man of the city, I just want a phrase like that to wrap it up. I remember looking in vain last time for answers, too.

http://www.wordinfo.info/words/index/info/view_unit/1035

The 'polis' root is the some in both I would think.

bobula
Jul 3, 2007
a guy hello

Krinkle posted:

Just finished rereading men at arms. What did vetinari mean about "politician"? I'm looking it up on dictionary.com but it keeps linking to other words. Does it mean "guy who personifies the city" or "city boss" or something? Word origins should be easier to find than this.

I just thought he meant like, someone who deals in being polite. But maybe not. :(

Poor Mans Randbrick
Feb 18, 2007

I love Pratchett, but he's got that Wodehousian trait of rehashing plots with different names and settings. I didn't see much of a difference between Lords and Ladies and Carpe Jugulum, for example.

poofromfud
Apr 8, 2007

Keshik posted:

Although, of course, the best joke Pratchett has ever written, was, and remains to this day, the footnote on page thirty-nine of Men at Arms.

What is the joke?

withak
Jan 15, 2003


Fun Shoe
Something about the first thief stealing fire from the gods, but being unable to fence it because it was too hot. Then there is a nested footnote saying that he got burned on that deal.

ONE YEAR LATER
Apr 13, 2004

Fry old buddy, it's me, Bender!
Oven Wrangler

Hrolf Pyjama posted:

I love Pratchett, but he's got that Wodehousian trait of rehashing plots with different names and settings. I didn't see much of a difference between Lords and Ladies and Carpe Jugulum, for example.

One is about elves, one is about vampires :v:

edit: Speaking of rehashing plots Making Money comes out on the 18th, which is next Tuesday.

ONE YEAR LATER fucked around with this message at 05:55 on Sep 13, 2007

Ohthehugemanatee
Oct 18, 2005

Krinkle posted:

Just finished rereading men at arms. What did vetinari mean about "politician"? I'm looking it up on dictionary.com but it keeps linking to other words. Does it mean "guy who personifies the city" or "city boss" or something? Word origins should be easier to find than this.

Think about what -ician means as a suffix. Electrician, mortician, obstetrician... they're all specialists responsible for making sure their field goes smoothly. About half the medical specialties end in that suffix, which makes me think that the Patrician thinks of himself in that regard.

Aristurtle Records
Jun 9, 2006

live at random, live as best one can
The watch is cool, but I'd really like another witches book. I love Nanny Ogg.

I think it's kinda odd that there's been a couple recent books where the post office is (re)invented, and the newspaper, and those get integrated into the Discworld, but stuff from earlier books like movies and rock music is this big evil that gets destroyed and never talked about again.

Captain Hero
Nov 25, 2005

by Eris Is Goddess
I'm excited...I just found out he is doing a publicity tour and this time his appearance is close enough and at an hour where I can go and meet him. All I want to do is express my appreciation for the countless hours of joy he has given me.

I am wondering if Tiffany Aching will show up in the next witches book...

ONE YEAR LATER
Apr 13, 2004

Fry old buddy, it's me, Bender!
Oven Wrangler

bullshit sunrise posted:

The watch is cool, but I'd really like another witches book. I love Nanny Ogg.

I think it's kinda odd that there's been a couple recent books where the post office is (re)invented, and the newspaper, and those get integrated into the Discworld, but stuff from earlier books like movies and rock music is this big evil that gets destroyed and never talked about again.

Vetinari references the events of Moving Pictures in The Truth, actually. He summons William and asks him if the printing press is going to unleash a giant monster on the city like the movies did.

bobula
Jul 3, 2007
a guy hello
I'm going to the Making Money signing in Torrance on the 24th. I'm also hoping to go to the one in NYC on the 1st of October but that is a bit of a long shot if I can get off work to take the trip I was planning to anyway. Anyone else going to the signings?

Captain Hero
Nov 25, 2005

by Eris Is Goddess

bobula posted:

I'm going to the Making Money signing in Torrance on the 24th. I'm also hoping to go to the one in NYC on the 1st of October but that is a bit of a long shot if I can get off work to take the trip I was planning to anyway. Anyone else going to the signings?

If you look up two posts you will see I mentioned I was going. The Torrance one, as well. :woop:

Oovee
Jun 21, 2007

No life king.
Yay! More Moist von Lipvig.. then again I don't seem to be getting tired of the watch either.

Nice suprise for glum sunday to notice the pratchett book is coming out in 2 days :)

ONE YEAR LATER
Apr 13, 2004

Fry old buddy, it's me, Bender!
Oven Wrangler
Tomorrow is the release date for Making Money but I swung by the book store earlier tonight and the woman was stocking new stuff on the shelves and they had a bunch of signed copies so I scooped one up and I'm gonna start it tonight.

Krinkle
Feb 9, 2003

Ah do believe Ah've got the vapors...
Ah mean the farts


ONE YEAR LATER posted:

Tomorrow is the release date for Making Money but I swung by the book store earlier tonight and the woman was stocking new stuff on the shelves and they had a bunch of signed copies so I scooped one up and I'm gonna start it tonight.

and you swear you're not in England or something? I don't have to wait eight months for it to be localized and for all the superfluous u's removed? I can walk into a bookstore tomorrow and it will be there?

ONE YEAR LATER
Apr 13, 2004

Fry old buddy, it's me, Bender!
Oven Wrangler
Unless Albany, NY was up and moved to the UK when I wasn't looking last night then yes, I am in America. But I'm not sure about the extra u's yet.

ConfusedUs
Feb 24, 2004

Bees?
You want fucking bees?
Here you go!
ROLL INITIATIVE!!





I'm most of the way done with Lords and Ladies and I'm liking it far more than any of the previous Witches novels. Pratchett's elves are loving scary and awesome. Also it's about time Magrat kicked rear end instead of being Granny's verbal punching bag.

LooseChanj
Feb 17, 2006

Logicaaaaaaaaal!

ONE YEAR LATER posted:

Unless Albany, NY was up and moved to the UK when I wasn't looking last night

This demands some fiddling with google earth and photoshop, and a spiffy "that'll teach you to keep an interest in local affairs" comment but honestly I'm too busy reading Witches Abroad.

bobula
Jul 3, 2007
a guy hello

ONE YEAR LATER posted:

Tomorrow is the release date for Making Money but I swung by the book store earlier tonight and the woman was stocking new stuff on the shelves and they had a bunch of signed copies so I scooped one up and I'm gonna start it tonight.

gently caress, I was just by a Borders tonight and I could have checked if they happened to have it in early DD: I don't know if they make you buy the book at the same time as the signing in order to have it signed or if I could just bring an already bought copy. I really want to read it like now but I don't want to have to buy two copies.

Krinkle
Feb 9, 2003

Ah do believe Ah've got the vapors...
Ah mean the farts


I set my garmin to constantly search for the word "book" and in my hour and a half commute I passed three christian bookstores and not a single B&N or borders :mad:

Is it only out in hardcover right now? I want it to match the other 33 books in my collection. I couldn't find a paperback when I tried to preorder it.

farraday
Jan 10, 2007

Lower those eyebrows, young man. And the other one.
Paperbacks in the US generally come out 6 months to a year following the hardcover.

I believe they come out sooner in Europe though.

withak
Jan 15, 2003


Fun Shoe
I just picked up a signed one tonight as well. :hellyeah:

My boss is out of the office tomorrow so I know what I'll be doing all day at work. :)

Mukaikubo
Mar 14, 2006

"You treat her like a lady... and she'll always bring you home."
Received and finished Making Money last night.

One-Sentence Review: Moist is a very interesting character and Making Money is another book with the same rough narrative structure as Going Postal, and the result is a book almost as good as Going Postal.

More in depth complaint about the plot, light-moderate spoilers:

It's not quite as good as Going Postal, in my opinion, but only because the villain isn't as interesting as Reacher Gilt. Cosmo Lavish is insane. I mean, even by the relaxed standards of Discworld the man is utterly binkers. As a result, it never feels quite so threatening as the conflict in Going Postal- there's no equivalent to the excellent Restaurant Reservation scene in GP, for example. However, it is extremely interesting that both Moist books so far have had main villains trying to become Patrician...

There is an extremely funny set of scenes in the book. They involve clockwork toys. "Toys", as in, "Toys" you may possibly find in a shop of ill-repute. I am desperately attempting to describe this circumspectly.

farraday
Jan 10, 2007

Lower those eyebrows, young man. And the other one.

Mukaikubo posted:

Received and finished Making Money last night.

One-Sentence Review: Moist is a very interesting character and Making Money is another book with the same rough narrative structure as Going Postal, and the result is a book almost as good as Going Postal.

More in depth complaint about the plot, light-moderate spoilers:

It's not quite as good as Going Postal, in my opinion, but only because the villain isn't as interesting as Reacher Gilt. Cosmo Lavish is insane. I mean, even by the relaxed standards of Discworld the man is utterly binkers. As a result, it never feels quite so threatening as the conflict in Going Postal- there's no equivalent to the excellent Restaurant Reservation scene in GP, for example. However, it is extremely interesting that both Moist books so far have had main villains trying to become Patrician...

There is an extremely funny set of scenes in the book. They involve clockwork toys. "Toys", as in, "Toys" you may possibly find in a shop of ill-repute. I am desperately attempting to describe this circumspectly.

I don't know, many of the Ankh Morpork books have had villains trying to replace the patrician. I would also definitely agree that it didn't feel like there was much of a threat. Yes, like Nobby said you just know Moist is going to win, but it seems like instead of one large enemy he's faced with a host of small problems and he just bulldozes through them with verve and elan with hardly any threat to himself.

withak
Jan 15, 2003


Fun Shoe

Mukaikubo posted:

There is an extremely funny set of scenes in the book. They involve clockwork toys. "Toys", as in, "Toys" you may possibly find in a shop of ill-repute. I am desperately attempting to describe this circumspectly.

"A clockwork device of an intimate nature." :) The best part is when it is vibrating Mr. Fussypants forwards and backwards across the floor during the trial.

I also like how the patrician always specifies that here is no rush when requesting a meeting. :)

It made me want to go back and re-read Going Postal.

Hammerstein
May 6, 2005

YOU DON'T KNOW A DAMN THING ABOUT RACING !
I really used to like Pratchet, but personally I consider his earlier works superior to his later books. Especially the early Rincewind stories are way more fun.

However, this might also come from the fact that once you have read a few books you get used to Pratchet´s way of story-telling. He always used the same loop, take some underdog character, an evil villain and his henchman, some unlikely allies and put them into a typical deus-ex-machina rollercoaster.

This is especially disturbing during some of the Guards as well as Witches books, where you get villains who are described as immensely evil and powerful but in the end go out with a whimper instead of a bang.

But as I said, as a reader you most likely get this effect once you get used to the typical Pratchet plotline, for someone new to his works the books provide real good entertainment.

Captain Hero
Nov 25, 2005

by Eris Is Goddess

Hammerstein posted:

I really used to like Pratchet, but personally I consider his earlier works superior to his later books. Especially the early Rincewind stories are way more fun.

However, this might also come from the fact that once you have read a few books you get used to Pratchet´s way of story-telling. He always used the same loop, take some underdog character, an evil villain and his henchman, some unlikely allies and put them into a typical deus-ex-machina rollercoaster.

This is especially disturbing during some of the Guards as well as Witches books, where you get villains who are described as immensely evil and powerful but in the end go out with a whimper instead of a bang.

But as I said, as a reader you most likely get this effect once you get used to the typical Pratchet plotline, for someone new to his works the books provide real good entertainment.

I'm sure this is exactly why he continues to grow in popularity. All those people who get sick of him stop buying the books but somehow even more new readers jump on board.

Sarcasm aside, thanks for the input. I'll go read some more of Making Money now.

Anyone know why people are finding signed copies?

ONE YEAR LATER
Apr 13, 2004

Fry old buddy, it's me, Bender!
Oven Wrangler
It says they're specially bound editions from the publisher so they probably just sat him down in a room last time he was at Harper Collins and had him sign a couple hundred front pages so they could charge a bit more for them.

Ohvee
Jun 17, 2001

ONE YEAR LATER posted:

Unless Albany, NY was up and moved to the UK when I wasn't looking last night then yes, I am in America. But I'm not sure about the extra u's yet.
There probably won't be any there by the time I have a chance to get to Albany, but what store? Was it at crossgates?

ONE YEAR LATER
Apr 13, 2004

Fry old buddy, it's me, Bender!
Oven Wrangler
No, the Book House in Stuyvesant Plaza. They had, I think, 5 copies when I was there on Monday, not counting the one I bought, so there's probably some still there.

I'm sure the Borders in Crossgates has copies though.

mistermojo
Jul 3, 2004

Haha cool, I just got it in the mail from Amazon.com and I used the cheapest 3-5 day shipping!

Aaron Burr
Mar 7, 2004

President of the Republic of Louisiana, 1808-1816

ONE YEAR LATER posted:

It says they're specially bound editions from the publisher so they probably just sat him down in a room last time he was at Harper Collins and had him sign a couple hundred front pages so they could charge a bit more for them.

This seems to be A Thing in publishing now, though when I got a signed copy of The Yiddish Policeman's Union there wasn't any difference in price.

withak
Jan 15, 2003


Fun Shoe
My signed one was even 30% off.

ONE YEAR LATER
Apr 13, 2004

Fry old buddy, it's me, Bender!
Oven Wrangler
Well that's the price for supporting an independent bookstore then.

edit: It wasn't any more expensive than normal, I guess I just assumed it would be for some reason.

Sylphosaurus
Sep 6, 2007

ONE YEAR LATER posted:

Vetinari references the events of Moving Pictures in The Truth, actually. He summons William and asks him if the printing press is going to unleash a giant monster on the city like the movies did.
More Lovecraft references: The Patrician also refers to an "incident" that involved Dagon street and a sushi eatery during a full moon. :cthulhu:

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LooseChanj
Feb 17, 2006

Logicaaaaaaaaal!
Probably the most annoying thing about Pratchett's work is that his characters seem to love that most grating (to me anyway) of grammatical errors "should of", "would of", etc. But since it sounds the same, shouldn't he spell "should've" properly?

:sigh: Just had to get that off my chest, thanks for reading, etc.

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