h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Mort is one that I gave to many people to get them into Pratchett.

I'd certainly read that.

The Nightwatch as well as that really is Pratchett writing literature.

Personally I **hated** Soul music. In fact after it I didn't read any Pratchett for about 10 years before getting back into it.

I really think the Watch books arethe best ones for people to start off on. Colour Of Magic/Light Fantastic whilst ace, are just not accessable in the same way. Discworld Muggles should avoid until a little more enmeshed in the universe i'd say.

FB

"Soul Music" and "Moving Pictures" were, it seemed to me, formulaic plots strung around an excuse to do as many puns or in-jokes about music or films as possible. Gag-books, effectively. From any other author they'd be brilliant. Either one is a million times better than anything extruded onto the page from the anus of Craig Shaw Gardner, for instance. Avoid that man's work like the plague if you know what's good for you. It's just that in the context of the rest of Pratchett's books, they're not the greatest.

Re: "Strata" and "Dark Side of the Sun" - if you like Larry Niven's sf, do read them. They're quite clearly a near-plagiaristic homage to Niven's Known Space stories. And they're not BAD. Again, they're just not as good as his other stuff, and he was quite young when he wrote them. "Strata" in particular is of academic interest because you can see him working out some of the ideas that led to Discworld as he's writing it.

Hmmm, I started reading Pratchett with The Colour of Magic and then The Light Fantastic.

(But this was when there weren't very many more than that).

So I'm kind of in agreement with those that say do read those first.

But then...

I thought they weren't all that good, poor-man's Douglas Adams for me is what I've always said. So I never read any of the others. Reading this thread, maybe I should. I certainly enjoyed Going Postal on the telly and one of the Death stories as a cartoon...

Oooh... I'm glad I noticed this thread. I didn't know they'd made Going Postal theatrically. (And it's available on Netflix! )

My introduction to Pratchett was completely and utterly serendipitous. I saw a copy of The Fifth Elephant in the bargain rack at a bookstore and picked it up. It was an odd story to read with no previous knowledge of the Discworld. I had to go back and read it again after I went back to Colour of Magic and several others.

Here's a very handy guide to Discworld reading order.

http://www.lspace.org/books/reading-order-guides/the-discworld-reading-order-guide-20.jpg

I need to go through all my books and see what I've missed. I've got most of them in paper back and several in first edition hard bound. And one e-version.

Back to the DVDs. I absolutely loved the live action ones so far, Hogfather and Colour of Magic. But so far, some of the animated ones have been dreadful. And yeah, Soul Music, while I moderately enjoyed the book, the animated feature was unwatchable.

"The Pratchett they'll still be talking about in three hundred years is "Small Gods". I'm amazed it's legal to sell it in the USA, and that there haven't been huge bonfires of it surrounded by incensed Christians who've never read it, but been told it's the work of Satan." [Hoovooloo]

I can hardly wait to read it, then. Nothing whets my appetite more than the knowledge that literal-minded "fundamentalists" object to something. As for Muslim objections, I recall that it was "Satanic verses" that made me determined to read Salman Rushdie.
"Haroun and the Sea of Stories" was heartbreaking in its implications about the drying up of imagination because of tyranny.

"I recommend that you give Strata and The Dark Side of the Sun a miss. (They're not part of the Discworld series and they're very poor in quality). [Gnomon]

Thanks for the advice.

"I also recommend that you don't start reading the Discworld series at the start with The Colour of Magic, as it is one of the worst in the series"[Gnomon]

My brother-in-law said that it took four or five books for Pratchett to get up to speed. That's why "Guards! Guards!" was recommended as a starting point. However, I've seen some interesting recommendations for "Light Fantastic" and "Wyrd Sisters," so I will add them to my list.

"Interesting Times is well worth a read and I think it is the funniest of the disc world books - although Small Gods and Good Omens are a bit deeper" [Tucuxii]

"Good Omens" is not a Disc World book. I've already read it anyway, though.

Why do folks in the UK cling to the idea that the US bans controversial things? When I visited London in 1985 I picked up a single of Malcolm McLaren's Nineteen. I only bought it because it was the number one hit in the UK at the time and I hadn't heard it at home in Texas (or on MTV). Everyone kept telling me that was because it was banned (the song was critical of the US war in Viet Nam).

Well, just a few weeks after I returned, Nineteen was the number one hit in the US as well. We don't ban things here. At least not by law. The worst that happens is commercial distribution may be difficult for controversial works. Some private companies may pass on certain works. More often than not, it's done simply for economic reasons as they may think a certain work just wouldn't have a large enough market here to make it worth it to them. There have been works that were unavailable here for some time (Battle Royale comes to mind) but eventually enough interest made it worth it for another company to import it.

The worst incident I can think of was the digital editing of Eyes Wide Shut (I still haven't seen the European version but I haven't tried to find one recently). But even that was still the decision of Kubrick and the studio and distributor. There is no legal restriction on it that doesn't simply involve international distribution and copyright.

The single most important recommendation is that if you're going to read "The Light Fantastic", you MUST read "The Colour of Magic" first. They're effectively one book, split into two. It would make no sense at all to read the second without reading the first. You might just as well start reading "The Restaurant at the End of the Universe" before reading HHGG.

Note, re: Small Gods. Fundamentalists have NOT objected to it. There've been no protests. Nothing said by anyone. I assume that this is because only sane, rational people have read it and understood it. The religious have either never read it, or if they did they missed the central point. It's inconceivable to me that anyone with religious authority could read it, understand, and not be mortally offended by it.

I may have been exaggerating for comedy effect. We know you don't ban things. We know you DO burn things. Books and records you don't like, things like that. Beatles records, Korans, whatever.

>Why do folks in the UK cling to the idea that the US bans controversial things?<

Smoke a Havana cigar recently?

You mean they don't burn those??

What does that have to do with what I was talking about? Did I say the US doesn't ban anything? Obviously I was talking about creative works.

I should add however that often local governments, specifically often local school administrations have often banned certain works. But the US government doesn't. (yet)

I agree with Hoo that The Colour of Magic and The Light Fantastic are effectively one book. I'd recommend you don't start with them.

They're both a piss-take of fantasy books in general rather than being about the real world. Later Discworld books tend to about a topic found in the real world, such as the theatre, the post office, jingoism, sexism, football and so on. Many books are about a number of real-world topics simultaneously.

I also agree about Small Gods being the best book about religion ever written.

If you want my opinion on which ones you must read, I'd say Mort, Wyrd Sisters, Guards Guards, Small Gods, Feet of Clay, Night Watch and The Wee Free Men.

The ones I thought were poor were The Colour of Magic, The Light Fantastic, Equal Rites, Sourcery, Jingo, The Fifth Elephant, Monstrous Regiment and Snuff.

Nation was an excellent book about religion. It's not a discworld book, however.

>> You MUST read "The Colour of Magic", "The Light Fantastic"
and "Equal Rites" in that order, first. <<

"MUST"?? In full caps?
Sheesh, that's a bit didactic even for Hoo.

But I'll cut him some slack and just say that
claiming the need to read them chronologically
is merely anal. And thereby mostly harmless.

I started with THUD and I'm glad I did.


~jwf~

jwf, I think you misread Hoo's posting. He said, and he is correct, that the first two Discworld books are effectively one book. He's right that it would not make sense to read the second one first, because you wouldn't understand the story, any more than if you were to read the second volume of "The Lord of the Rings" first, or Act 2 of Julius Caesar.

Gnomon thou dost protest too much.

I know my Hoo and he definitely said MUST
and 'in that order' and 'first'. Not just to the
first two books but three. I will stand by
my diagnosis of didactic and anal.

And I have to agree with others who found
they could enjoy the first three/four books
only after developing a fondness for the
writer and his whirled. Only then could I
forgive several clumsy slapstick moments
and impersonations of a DNA type style
that are so out of phase with the more
mature Discworld atmosphere.

*waves to TC knowing how much more we elder folks
can enjoy all the references in Soul Music*


~jwf~

"claiming the need to read them chronologically is merely anal. And thereby mostly harmless. I started with THUD and I'm glad I did" [jwf]

I'm guilty as charged. I said at the outset that I wanted to read the books chronological. If that's anal, then so be it. I have "Going Postal" in my hand. It doe not list "Thud" on the page facing the title page. Therefore, I assume that it came *after* "Going Postal."

If Hoovooloo et al are right about "Light Fantastic" being a Siamese twin of "Color of Magic," then I will read neither. I will start with "Wyrd Sisters" and proceed from there to "Guards! Guards!" Even skipping a few early books, I still face three or four months of reading Pratchett. This is not a small undertaking. The non-Disc World books will be shelved indefinitely, except for the one I've already read.

For what it's worth, when I read "Making Money," the cover said that it was by the author of the New York Times bestseller "Thud." Eventually I will read "Thud," so I will finally be on the same page as jwf. Rome wasn't built in a day...

Ah, I see. You were looking at posting 7, while I was looking at posting 47 which is different.

If Hoo is going to say you MUST read the first three books before reading any of the others, I'd go so far as to say you MUST NOT read them until you've a few of the others under your belt.

Orcus makes my point about the first books.

>>..poor-man's Douglas Adams for me is what I've
always said. So I never read any of the others. <<

But I have to say that I have yet to see any of the
films or cartoons come close to my vision of Discworld.
They are well done, yes, and obviously done with love
and devotion - it's just that they don't fit my 'view'.

Orcus, try THUD, Thief of Time, Mort, Nightwatch or
go deep and get into his masterpiece, SNUFF.


~jwf~