Unseen Academicals

[Baruch Menachem]

Newest Pratchett Book. Well worth the time, but more anvilcillious than usual. But I like the message, and it is beyond the comprehension of a lot of folks, so that is ok.


Some interesting new characters that you will want to know more about. We hear more about Mightily Oats, but only in passing. Rincewind is a full professor now.

As always there are the great throw away lines that say more in 15 words than other authors can say in 20 volumes.

He is too british in places, and he is too deep into his own universe, but if you are the kind of fan who has read several of the books, it is familiar territory, but if you are new to the Pratchett universe, it would be easy to get lost.

 

[Missourian]

"Build a man a fire, he'll be warm for a day...SET a man on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life"

 

[Mad Scientist]

"Anvilcillious". I had to look that up.

A portmanteau of anvil and either delicious or malicious, depending on the usage, anvilicious describes a writer's and/or director's use of an artistic element, be it line of dialogue, visual motif, or plot point, to so obviously or unsubtly convey a particular message that they may as well etch it onto an anvil and drop it on your head. Frequently, the element becomes anvilicious through unnecessary repetition, but true masters can achieve anviliciousness with a single stroke

Not bagging on yer spelling, I really had never heard that term before.

Unseen Academicals - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The title is a play on the names of rugby and football teams in the UK who have or have had a connection to educational institutions, examples being Hamilton Academical and Edinburgh Academicals.

Having never read the books I assume it's sorta like Harry Potter?

 

[Baruch Menachem]

It is more like Gulliver's travels. But since very few people go very far, it could be At home with the Laputins. if such a book existed.

It is set on a flat, disc world riding on elephants standing on a turtle. Magic is real. But Magic is subject to Newton's laws of conservation of energy, so using magic is not that encouraged. there are lots of races like Trolls, Vampires, werwolves, gnomes, elves, Igors, dwarves..... But they are none of them what you expect. Everything is set to eleven on a scale of one to nine, and examined from a fifth dimensional perspective.

None of this would work without Pratchet's style, which is very much like PG Wodehouse explaining Nietzsche.

If you want good starter books, check out "Good Omens" "The Truth" or "Small Gods."

 

[Missourian]

Having never read the books I assume it's sorta like Harry Potter?

Not even close...

I've laughed so hard read Pratchett, I've injured myself.

The subject of many of the novels in Pratchett's Discworld series is a parody of a real-world subject such as film making, newspaper publishing, rock and roll music, religion, philosophy, Ancient Greece, Egyptian history, the Gulf War, Australia, university politics, trade unions, and the financial world. Pratchett has also included further parody as a feature within the stories, including such subjects as Ingmar Bergman films, numerous fiction, science fiction and fantasy characters, and various bureaucratic and ruling systems.

Terry Pratchett - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
​

I started with "Thief of Time", then "Men at Arms" and then I started at the beginning and worked my way thru.

​