The Truth Shall Make Ye Fret - Terry Pratchett Day 2024 - Starting in the Wrong Place

Episode Date: April 27, 2024

The Truth Shall Make Ye Fret is a podcast in which your hosts, Joanna Hagan and Francine Carrel, read and recap every book from Sir Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series in chronological order. This week, we’re celebrating Terry Pratchett Day! Jumping on the theme of “Start in the Wrong Place” - we’re talking about some of the best (and worst) places to get started with Terry Pratchett’s work. Find us on the internet:Twitter: @MakeYeFretPodInstagram: @TheTruthShallMakeYeFretFacebook: @TheTruthShallMakeYeFretEmail: [e-mail]: www.patreon.com/thetruthshallmakeyefretDiscord: https://discord.gg/29wMyuDHGP Want to follow your hosts and their internet doings? Follow Joanna on twitter @joannahagan and follow Francine @francibambi Things we blathered on about:Quiz - Discworld EmporiumSoul Music (TV series) - Wikipedia DAVE GREENSLADE From The Discworld reviews 29: Eric Pt.1 (Corporate Nonsense Demon) - The Truth Shall Make Ye Fret Lisa McCormick - BBC Radio 5 Live Music: Chris Collins, indiemusicbox.com

Hello and welcome to The True Shall Make Ye Fret, a podcast in which we are usually reading and recapping every book from Terry Pratchett's Discworld series, one assignment in chronological order. I'm Joanna Higgins. And I'm Francine Carroll. And today we are not recapping a book in chronological order from Terry Pratchett's Discworld series. In fact, chronological order is not the name of the game. Is it not? It usually is. No, we are celebrating Terry Pratchett Day 2024 with the theme of Start in the Wrong Place and we're going to be talking today about the best and worst Discworld starting

places. Ooh. Exciting. A bonus. Yeah. Note on spoilers before we crack on, we are a Spoiler Lite podcast. We want to keep this episode as beginner friendly as possible so we won't be spoiling any major events in any Discworld novels. We will be defining what major events are as we go along and I'm sure there will be no debate

whatsoever. And as always, we are saving any and all discussion of the final Discworld novel, The Shepherd's Crown, so you, dear listener, can come on the journey with us. No matter where you decide to begin it. Perfect. Yes, as we said, it's Terry Pratchett Day 2024, great man's birthday and the Terry Pratchett State has announced the theme is starting in the wrong place. So we have a few different categories of places to start or not start in the Discworld. But before we dive into our categories, I had a look in the Discworld. But before we dive into our categories, I had a look at the Discworld Emporium website today. And they have a quiz you can do and

it recommends a book for you to start with. We love a personality quiz. I love a personality quiz. We were brought up on Cosmogirl and Miz. Many, many and then I think we're a little bit Buzzfeed era as well. A little bit, yeah. So I took the quiz. little bit Buzzfeed era as well. A little bit. Yeah. So I took the quiz, I took the quiz twice because I decided to do it. First time she got Hufflepuff.

I decided to do it as if I had not read Discworld and then having read a Terry Brantford book before. Oh, yes, the qualifier. Yes. So the if I had not read Discworld answer I got was Weird Sisters. Okay. Possibly because I answered some very weighted questions about wanting cottages rather than Stony University. Yes, but you've not read a book before, not read any books before. I've never read a book.

That's the question, right? Yeah. It was a have you read any books before question. Is this the first written text you've ever attempted? Maybe go back to each peach pear plum first. Oh, where's my cow? If I'm honest about having a regulatory practice book before it recommended I start with Good Omens.

Okay. Which is not a bad place. No, I didn't even think of that in my mental list of things. I only played once because I'm inherently an honest person. I got weird sisters. I said I had read it. I did also note the very weighted questions, but I can't be inaccurate. I would rather live in a becottedched woodland than whatever the fuck's going on in the middle of Anglepool. Yeah, no, I am a Becottedch wood limb person. I don't want to be anywhere near organized academia. Neither do the wizards. So our categories today are, we're going to talk a

little bit about the actual beginning. We're going to pick something from near the beginning, we're going to pick a story arc, a standalone, wild card, a non disc world, and we're going to pick a story arc, a standalone, wild card, a non-disc world, and we're going to have a quick chat about the absolute worst place to start. Yes. So let's start at the beginning, a very, very good place to start. Color of Magic, why start there, why not start there? Thoughts, Francie? I think yes, do start there, especially if you're a writer or you're interested in the

mechanics of writing. And I think I argued for this in the first few episodes of the podcast, and I'm trying to be consistent on at least a couple of things we've said over the last five years. So I'm sticking with my answer there. Incredible. And we've we've, you know, we've, this is my first chronological read through I know you've done. I know you've done chronological read throughs of this well before I never had. And so it really has been fantastic. See like the writing style change and evolve and seal the callbacks for the first time and everything like that. So yeah. I mean, I'm kind of with you. I will die on the hill that it's not a bad place to start. If I will, I'm going to do a general caveat over all of my answers, which is that I will

very much tailor my where should I start with Discworld based on who I'm talking to? Yeah, definitely. So with Color of Magic, it's I'll recommend starting there if I think someone is genuinely planning on having a good go of getting through the books. Yeah, but if you like give up on book series easily, like no judgment there at all. I definitely do sometimes if you're not in the right place to like power through a couple of chapters you're not interested in, maybe start somewhere else. But yeah, but I think it's a good starting point. right place to power through a couple of chapters you're not interested in, maybe start somewhere else. But I think it's a good starting point. As you said, it's really great watching it grow. The fact that it's little novellas as well, I think kind of helps. It's a nice gentle

dive in and then you know the characters really well when you go into the light fantastic. Nice gentle plummet off the edge of the disc. Lovely gentle plummet off the edge of the disc. Is that a major event? I think that's okay. It's okay. There's no context. And also, the colour of magic and the light fantastic, they're not going to get better if you read them later after you've read some of the other ones.

That's a good point. And I think it's kind of worth seeing, okay, and it can really grow from here. Yeah. I think revisiting them when you are so into Discworld as we are is also fun. But I think if you're somewhere in the middle, you're not new to Discworld and you're not like unreasonably obsessed with it. That might be a difficult thing to go back to. Although it's nice to see it like rinse wind and two flower meet for the first time. To

Devil's advocate on like why people say don't start with Color of Magic, because I often joke with the podcast Don't Start with Color of Magic because that's before we had decent microphones in any context of structure. Hey, hey, we had a plan. It was on three or four pages of paper. I've got a copy somewhere. I had a notebook and a series of unhinged post-it notes. Now my post-it notes are hinged. They're so hinged. They're very hinged Post-It notes. It is not the best. It doesn't quite demonstrate how good the books are going to get. We don't have witches, we don't really have much of

the city structure, especially with some of the things that happen to the city. The world building is intentionally completely nonsensical and it becomes a lot more an actually built world later on. And I think if you're not very familiar with what's being parodied, it's less accessible. Jess Yes. That's something else I remember talking about near the beginning of the podcast was you had obviously read a lot more fantasy than I had. And I think there were a lot of references you got that I didn't. Heather There is even stuff that went over my head, like the whole Wormberg section that happens,

I think it's the second of the novellas. One of our worst reviews mentions our failure to... To failure to reference the Anne McAfee Dragon Rider series, because it's just not something we both knew. Possibly should, like it's part of the Western fantasy canon, but I haven't read that much 70s and 80s fantasy. Yep. So yeah, Color of Magic. So if you're not going to start there but you're going to pick something from the first ten, what would you go with?

Niamh Well, I was quite pleased to get my quiz result because I had also picked Weird Sisters as my first ten. Everyone always says more, it's really not one of my favorites, I love Death as a character obviously, but I feel like the three witches are just much stronger main characters than Mort has. And also, it's a good way to feel smug about getting the references. Yeah, all the Shakespeare stuff. Like almost everyone can feel smug about at least a few references. And then like, if you're forced by some bizarre twist of fate slash your best friend to really consider

the book in depth, you get to learn a lot of literary stuff as well. I'm so glad you consider me a bizarre twist of fate darling. That's another one from the business card. I mean, I went with a similar tack, but I went with equal rise. Ah, okay. Because I think if you're going to skip the first two, this is a really great introduction to you still have some of the city stuff. In fact, you get more of the city in this.

That's a good point. There is more fog. Yeah. You've got the unseen university and dungeon dimensions of it all, but you also get more of the country life of it. The witches, it's the introduction of Granny motherfucking Weatherwax to give her her full title. Oh yeah. Esk is such a great character and I think it's really nice when you're starting with a series, especially because I think there can be trepidation. You go into a fantasy

series written by a bloke, so starting really well with, hey look at these incredibly rich, deep female main characters in the series right from the beginning. Yeah. And realistically as well, Esk is a petulant little girl for a lot of it. Yeah, it's not weird. Tad is still writing women either. Yeah, no. It's great. And it plays with the witches versus wizards dichotomy. So it takes something that's very established in fantasy wizards are boys and witches are girls and starts playing around with it, which is a really good like, this is what you're going to get.

Yeah. There's another point. Hey, hey, see that trope? Flip it. Remember? There's another point I had about it, but I have realized it's spoilery and I'm not going to say that. I'll tell you after the podcast. Okay, gossip. Give me the key on equal rights. A quick honorable mention, sneak in as well. I'm going to do this all the time. I'm bad at picking one thing. You made a podcast with a non-binary bisexual person. I can't choose

one thing. Moving pictures. Oh. Because you get a brief introduction to the university structure, introduction to Ponder Stevens, our heart. And I think it's one of the best early like direct parody. Look at this fun thing we're playing with books. Yeah. Is it the first, here's an outside thing arriving? Yeah, I think so. Here's another, not like the Dungeon Dimensions, but here's a thing from Round World turning

up in Discworld. Yeah, it is the first one of those. And it's just fun as well. It's a really fun read to quote something Joanna Robinson says on her podcast. It's a fun, fine time at the movies. It's a fun, fine time at the movies. I need to listen to more of her podcasts. Yes. So it delights me and I'm partly sneaking that in because it's one of my favorites. Yeah. Yeah. See, again, that's very much it's got to be a tailored one, hasn't it? Because I enjoyed that book, but I don't get as much from it as you do because again, that's very much it's got to be a tailored one, hasn't it? Because I enjoyed that book, but I don't get as much from it as you do because again, I don't get the references.

Yeah, I wouldn't have ever recommended you start with that because I know you're not a big movie person, but anyone I know who loves movies, especially like Golden Age of Hollywood movies, that's a really great starting point. Yeah. Yeah, weirdly enough, my husband probably would have gotten more of the references than I did, and he's just like not a fantasy reader at all. Absolutely. But that's nice. The books go outside so much more than fantasy very quickly. You had your media reviewer hat on for a second there. What am I talking about? I'm on a podcast talking about media. Carry on. Joanna, I'm hoping soon, by the way, I'm just gonna bring this up in the

middle of the podcast so that everybody remembers to see some cork boards and string in a video one day. Yes, I'm working on that. It is coming. So next category, a story arc. A story arc? I'm gonna suggest this comes from people often say, ah, you are someone where to start Discworld, they'll give you an unhinged flowchart. There is a lovely unhinged flowchart floating about. There are a few lovely unhinged flowcharts. But what those flowcharts generally do is highlight

these books all go into an arc together. So you might suggest someone starts with this book and reads all the books that have those same characters. you might suggest someone starts with this book and reads all the books that have those same characters. Niamh I've got witches again, sorry. I just think they're the most quintessentially fracturedy characters. Almost all of the Discworld concepts that I live deep in my brain, quite a lot of the time we go on about, this is just lived in my head and I couldn't have told you which book it was until we got to it again. Like the Half Moon and the things like that. Almost all of them come from the witches. Yeah, I don't know, how about you?

JG We didn't compare lists before we started recording so that we could surprise and delight each other and not very surprisingly, I also say witches. Ah, so I thought you might go Guards, Guards is the watch. I thought you might have gone with the watch. The problem here is we tried to second guess each other and we've double bluffed each other. Very much. But yeah, what you said, it's so quintessentially Pratchety. I think also I quite like there's two entry points with the witches because if you're introducing to a younger reader, you can start with the Tiffany Aking books.

I would say if doing that, I would go Tiffany Aking as far as Wintersmith and then I would backtrack to Equal Rights. CHARLEYY Okay, get the pre-calls. NICOLA Yeah. But that's because I like to overthink things. Weird Sisters again, also a great place to start if you want to skip Equal Rights because Granny Weatherwax does get reintroduced. CHARLEYY If you were recommending a reading order for a younger person that included the Tiffany Aking books, would you drop Morris in there anywhere? I know he's not a Tiffany Aking, but I feel like he's the same level of...

Yeah, I think I would go, if I was going to do that, I'd do like We Free Men, Hatful of Sky, Amazing Morris. Because I think the age Tiffany is in Hatful of Sky is very militia in Amazing Morris. Yeah, yeah. There's a lot of shared themes about stories and... Yeah. I would never think of Amazing Morris as like a I'm going to suggest start here. But I kind of started with it. I read that when I was 12 before and I didn't really realize it was a Discord book and I completely fell in love with it. And the movie's a great starting point. It's a really fun little movie.

It's a fun movie. We enjoyed that movie. But The Witches dives into Summer Practice best theme, Markov power of belief on your bingo card, which one of our listeners in our Discord has made us an actual bingo card now. I know. I'm trying to forget it now. I don't even specifically ask for it. The Witches books, they've got some of his best plays on existing stories. So you have Shakespeare, you have fairy tales and fair fairy tales with an E. Right. Sorry, I thought you'd had a moment.

I'm often having a moment. Darling, we're talking about Terry Pratchett. Opera, you've got musicals casually playing with the entire Gothic literature canon in Carpe Jugulum, which is the best witch's book. I will brook no argument. Okay. I'll brook no argument now mostly because I think I already did a half hour PowerPoint presentation when we talked about Carpe Jekyllem. I think we can have a little argument about it at the retrospective episodes one day. Oh, absolutely. But yeah, as we've both said, which is to quickly offer some guards guards.

Yes. Yeah, let's now argue for the watchbooks. I'd say if I'm talking to somebody who's less fantasy inclined and more like, not even police procedural inclined, but it has more experience with that kind of thing, or like thriller or anything like that, I'd say start with the watch. Detectives as well. There's a lot of like mystery elements in there. Or indeed, Douglas Adams fan, I know that's sci-fi rather than real-worldy stuff, but I think that's the kind of, it's just a similar vibe to me. Niamh Yeah, I think it's character-based in a different way. You get these new sets of characters and you learn a lot about them and they quite often become focal points.

The reason I wouldn't recommend Guards and the Watchbooks as a starting point is something we talked about on the podcast is that you get a very similar storyline for the first three of those books. They're all really good books, it's really well handled. But I think if you read those three books in order. Yes, having the buffer between is helpful. Yeah. I think if I had gone that way, I would have got slightly frustrated with this guy just keeps telling the same story over and over again. Yeah. Despite having read, I think if I were gonna, if I've read an arc in its entirety, it's probably Rincewinds, which I did not pick for obvious reasons. But I think there's a lot of people who get on really well with that as an arc. Younger readers especially who weren't into the young adult stuff.

Yeah, no, that's true. That's what caught me. The Witches books are probably the ones, actually no, Susan's arc is probably the one I've read most, re-read in order. Because I have such a soft spot for soul music and then it's like, if I read soul music, I might as well read Hogfather. While I'm here. Joanna reads incredibly fast. She will just sit down. And accidentally reread a fiction book series. It's happened. Okay, so standalone. There are some, I mean, technically all the books standalone, but some are in arcs and some are more just about these characters today. I thought I'd introduce a tiny bit of controversy and say equal rights here.

Yeah? Okay. There's very little from this book that follows through to the other Witches novels apart from the presence of Granny. And I say she's a touch too recognisable for it to be totally standalone but she's not fully formed Granny yet and the adventures they go on are not really referenced again until a lot later. Yeah, I can see your argument for it being a standalone one. I know a lot of people who treat it as a bit separate to the witches arc, witches plural. I kind of agree in that I don't think you're really in the witches books until Nanny Hogg turns up.

Yeah. You can tell if you have like a glass of something made of mainly apples thrust into your hand and suddenly you're blushing a lot. Mine is more classic standalone, although obviously, as with all the books, it ties into the others. But it's Monstrous Regiment. Oh, yes. the books that ties into the others. But it's Monstrous Regiment. Which is a late in the series place to start. But it's really good. It is really good. I think it's a really good gateway drug for both the Watchbooks and the truth. It's really

fucking good. It is. As we talked about a lot during the episodes on it, it's not it's not Discworld book first. It's definitely and you could again, you could argue that a lot of the books, I think Monstrous Regiment specifically. And if I recall correctly, I think Pratchett said this a couple times as well, which was that this isn't, you know, Discworld is really just the backdrop for this one. Yeah, this is a story about this. Yeah, this is something Terry Pratchett talked about in like later interviews, because in the books are the disk is a disk on four elephants on a tassel. And that very rapidly became just a

backdrop. And not important. And yeah, then he talked about in interviews, you know, I wish I kind of hadn't bothered with that, because that's what I get asked about first. We're really not about that anymore. It's like that one omnibus episode that talked about Discworld briefly. Yeah. It was like, Sam Vimes, Space Detective. I was like, I can't, hmm. I mean, I mean. But yeah, when you see like, the brief description of the Discworld or like the artwork, you know, the Tartles. Yeah. The Beasts of the Tartles. Quietly, the curling storm is part C greater to N. But yeah, no, I love Monster's Regiment.

I think it dives into stuff that Pratchett writes about really well and it's at a point where he's really developed that. So the gender stuff, this depiction of war from a very small place and politics and conflict, ideas of belief and a- Yeah, a peak sergeant with Jackrum. Peak sergeant with Jackrum. Sergeant Jackrum is one of my all time favourite Pratchett characters. He's just a delight throughout. Absolutely delight. Pax! It uses pre-existing lore in a really nice way. There's a werewolf,

there's vampires and eagles and trolls and they're all stuff that have been introduced in the books but they're treated as new enough. You don't feel lost or at sea with it. Yeah, definitely. Especially if I'm going to be introducing Discworld to someone who's somewhere in the queer part of the spectrum, someone who's interested in feminism and that sort of thing. One of my friendly lesbians, I'm probably going to go here, read Monstrous Regiment and then I'm sorry, the rest aren't necessarily as good. Okay. I like it. I like it. Yep. Small Gods is the most popular answer I'd say to this,

isn't it? Yeah. And Small Gods is a great one. Going from like discussions like the Union I like it. Yeah. Small Gods is the most popular answer I'd say to this, isn't it? Yeah, and Small Gods is a great one. Going from discussions like the Union forums and things. Yeah, it's a fantastic book. And it is a standalone story, but I think it's almost too standalone. Yes. Yeah, maybe not the easiest gateway to the rest of it. Yeah, I think it's a gorgeous book in its own right, but I wouldn't say, oh, read this and then go read these other books. Like I wouldn't I couldn't see a good point to go to from Small Gods. Yes. Yeah, you'd have to be convinced that they'd love this one so much. They'd just go and find the rest. Which you know, a lot of people would.

Well, yeah, fair. So wild card, what's your wild card? I've gone for the last hero. So have I. Oh fuck off. I wasn't even thinking about what you would pick. This could be literally anything, it didn't have to be Disque World, it didn't have to be a book. And we both got the last hero.

All right, fine. Do you think maybe we're too in sync sometimes? Yeah. All right, well, good. We can pick another one afterwards, because we know we've got honorable mentions. But let's have a little rant and rave in a positive way about The Last Hero. I mean, it's a good way to get graphic novel lovers on board for a start, isn't it? Yeah. Technically, it's an illustrated novella rather than a graphic novel. What's the difference?

A graphic novel, I think, more like comic books. It's action with mostly dialogue and a small amount of narration, whereas this is a written story. You could technically represent the story without the illustrations. Whereas a graphic novel without the context of the graphic would not make sense as a novel. Right. So graphic novel, Watchmen would still be a graphic novel. Watchmen is a graphic novel, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Even though it's got a little bit more writing than... Text.

Yeah. Cool, cool. Got it. But yeah. And also just because Cohen the Barbarian is just such a wonderful character. And I think this is like his finest hour. If you're going to show somebody Cohen the Barbarian, like there's no blanket problematic sticker to put on this one. Like there are some interesting times. You don't have to go super early. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. What made you think of it particularly? I mean, part of it is just yeah, it's a nice easy read, you can pick it up and go through it. It's beautiful. The illustrations are incredible and you can sit and stare at them

for hours as we talked about when we talked about the book. Again, it's got a lot of the big thematic stuff that we love, but it's very digestible. There's no better introduction to this idea of gods and belief and also barbarians. It's such a good example of Pranash doing, well, I'm doing this my way. So barbarians for elderly and then just casually also let's go to space with dragons. Yeah. And the movie. Yeah. And you get veterinary. And veterinary is there and Leonard's there.

And ponder? Ponder's around while we're sorting out the spaceship. Carrots there. Carrots there. Carrots there looking glorious with the shiny helmet. The luggage is there being a monster. Sweet little menace. It's a great book.

I think it's a good wildcard choice. And you got the bard. You got the power of stories. Yes, power of stories, power of reputation. Yeah, legacy we talked about. Yeah. Yes. Look at us remembering some key words from the hours and hours we put into talking about

these. A normal healthy amount of hours we've put into talking about these. I haven't counted up the hours since we reached the 100th episode and I only did that for like a bit in a TikTok video. I'll do it again at some point just to upset myself. I'm gonna let you do that because I don't want to. The important thing is we'll never know how many unedited hours it was because I lost some of the original file. Yeah, I think I don't think I've got those anymore either.

No, good. Let's not let's not think about that. Did you have any honorable mentions for wildcard then since you? I had an honorable method. I thought, tell you what, just pick up a D12, roll it, pick the corresponding book, maybe scribble out the two so you don't accidentally start with the light fantastic. Which is one of a couplet for anyone who's not gotten back to those yet. The colour of magic and light fantastic really do need to be read in order. Yeah. I'm sure actually I know a lot of people haven't, I'm pretty sure at least one person, it might have even been Al, the host of Desert

Island Deskworld, or one of his guests started with that one. What started with the light fantastic? Yeah, just because that was the one that was lying around. Not sure if it was Al or a guest, but yeah. Yeah, I like the idea of rolling a die actually. That is a fun way to get into it. What's your honorable mention? Oh, I mean, I have many and now my mind's gone blank. I would say possibly the Mob Films Hogfather adaptation.

Okay, yeah. Because sometimes starting with an adaptation is nicer, especially I found when I was younger, I would sometimes find books a bit tough to read. And I'd watch an adaptation of it like Lord of the Rings. It was easier to read once I'd seen an adaptation because someone set up some visuals for me. Did you see the Unhinged cartoon first? Was that what you, that's a lot of things? No, I saw the unhinged cartoon many years later Because I would have been eight or nine, I think when the Fellowship of the Ring, like the Peter Jackson movie came out

Yeah, it came out like 2000 2001. It came out to, no it came out 2000 because Two Towers came out 2001 Because I was in America when it came out. Oh cool. Yeah, no, I didn't watch the films till years later so just in my head there. Oh, did you not? No, so I read the book later than you but I still read it before I watched the films. So I think I read the book when I was like 10 or 11.

Yeah, I'd read The Hobbit and then I think I read the books kind of along with the movies. Ah cool, yeah, yeah. That's nice. That's the fun way of doing it. Tolkien would not approve. Tolkien would not approve. I find it very amusing when people talk about like, oh, Tolkien would hate this or that, like it matters because Tolkien would not approve of any of you. No, Tolkien would hate me. It's very important to understand that. Tolkien and I would not be friends.

He didn't like hippies. He was absolutely baffled by the huge amount of like hippies that loved his books. But yeah, on the dice rolling thing, that was kind of what I ended up doing when I got into Discworld like when I was older, because someone lent me soul music when I was in my late teens and said, you love blues brothers, you'll love this. And then I was dating someone who loved Discworld and had all the books on it, but didn't have the books in order on his shelf. No, because of course he didn't. Yeah. So he was like, yeah, if you want to start reading them, just you can't touch that

because that's the last continent and it's signed. But anything else, just help yourself. So I wasn't reading them in order. I was just grabbing ones that I liked the title of off the shelf. That's probably how I read a lot of them because my mum had them. I'd have picked which cover I liked the best. And sometimes it was fun. I think the fifth elephant was the first watch book I read and then I went back to Garth's Garth's and I was like, oh, that's why they keep talking about a dragon. Arrested a dragon. Oh, it wasn't just like a hyperbolic joke. So on from world cards, what's our next category non Discworld? If you can suggest someone

starts with a Terry Pratchett book isn't part of the Discworld series, what would you suggest? My first choice was the Bromeliad trilogy. Just because I think it probably gives the best idea of what to expect from Discworld, even though it's like quite the earth, isn't it? I can't remember because we did that one out of the chronology, didn't we? Like, it's funny, it's like surprisingly philosophical, makes you cry in an un-consistent manner in public. And it's also like an early example of his writing for children being like an early example of his writing for children being just as hard hit hard hitting sorry I've got a tabloid as is as his writing for adults. And I will never forget just all this silly little intro bits and the the goose going not quite as fast as EG Concord. So I've got a place in my heart. What did you

have? I got an Honorable Mention Nation because I didn't pick it and I figured that was most likely to be yours. Yeah, it's also genuinely not what I'd have picked for most people. However, I have decided if I'm going to try and get Jack back into, if I'm going to try and get Jack back into, or if I'm going to try and get Jack to like a project, like it's going to be that one. It's, yeah, it's probably not a great starting point. But it's a really fucking good book. It's such a good book. If I want to make it clear to someone like, you know, this is a very talented author,

right? Yeah, yeah. Then I'm going to shove nation at them. Exactly. And especially if like, as with my husband Jack, if I know he's not going to read the main Discworld novels, it's just not his thing. But I'd love him to enjoy one of the books and I think it'd be that one. And it's a nice one to share. But no, my actual answer is the Johnny trilogy. So only you can save mankind, Johnny and the Bomb. What makes you think that's the best? I think it's a really good example of how we can take a very simple but interesting concept, and then dive into it really head first. So only you can save mankind, which the first was an example,

the concept, what if your video game starts interacting with you? And then it dives into it head first, it gets weird, it gets fiercely introspective. All of them start with very familiar and grounded stuff, and then the fantastic comes in. And by the time the fantastic stuff comes in, you're very comfortably in the book. So it feels normal, which I think is very disc-worldy. Like the fantastic stuff is also matter of fact and day to day. I'd be really interested to hear from somebody from either young Gen Zed, or even Generation Alpha. I don't know how old they are now. Everything's a bit scary. But reading those for the first time because I think we're on the tail end of the generation who remembers a lot of the tech references in these books.

And even though some of them went slightly above my head. Yeah, I don't know how many of them are still in like the mass consciousness through like osmosis through older media. And I'd be interested to see like even if you don't get those references, any of them, how fun it still is to read. Well, I think the mass consciousness through media theme is still very much something that's around now and you know our mass consciousness through media is being on social media. This is true. Rather than news broadcasts. I think the specific memories of it as the time of the first Gulf

War is definitely something that might go over people's heads a bit, but at the same time most people have at least a passing familiarity with living during a time of some kind of big war happening. Yeah. Yeah. Hmm. Any younger readers, listeners, both preferably, who've done this, who've read those books, please, please let us know. I'd be very interested, actually. I don't know what you thought about it. I'd also be interested in like non English perspectives on the third one, which is Johnny and the Bomb. Yes, the second one is Johnny and the Dead,

because Johnny and the Bomb is so tied into like, memories of World War Two history. And that really is like something that we kind of inherited memory of. Yeah, and we talked about it in such a specifically British way. And it is very that it's talking about the Blitz. And so yeah, I'd be curious to see what perspective from someone who didn't grow up with that specific education is. I don't know, my wildcard non-fiction one, I'd say maybe a slip of the keyboard for some people would be an interesting one. Just because I think it'd be really hard to read those essays and like resist the urge to find out more about what he's describing, like the world.

Yeah, a slip of the keyboard is one I'll dip into in and out sort of quite often to be fair, because there's so many beautiful essays on writing and which is the keyboard for context, if anyone's a new listener is a collection of Terry Pratchett's nonfiction writings, they're our schools and a couple of speeches and things like that. Yeah. Yeah. And it spans like decades. It's really interesting. That's a good wild card. things like that. Yeah. And it spans like decades. It's really interesting. That's a good wild card. I like that. And now we come to possibly my favorite category. The very worst place to start with Terry Pratches over. This is one book and one any other media.

Can I get you to start with a book? Because I'm still deciding from two I've got written down. So I have two as well. One's a choice, one's an honourable mention and I am curious to see what we've got in common here. But I think the worst Discworld book to start with is Sorcery. Okay, okay, yeah. I think even Terry Pratchett didn't really want to write that one. Public pressure. Yeah, there was public pressure for there to be like another Rincewind book. It does

that thing, but it does where he kind of tells the same story again, but a bit different. But this time it's Rincewind racing to stop an apocalypse. It's a bit of a repeat of The Light Fantastic, but it's less fun than The Light Fantastic. Nigel and Koenigna are not as delightful and compelling as Two Flower and Coen the Barbarian. And yeah, I just don't think it does anything particularly interesting. Half brick in a sock. Half brick in a sock and Rinse Wind gets a little bit of good character development in the end.

But yeah, it's just- Unless you already love Rinse Wind, maybe that's not as exciting as it is to me. I've really come around, I wasn't a big Rince Wind fan before we started the podcast and I have allowed you to convince me and I am a big Rince Wind fan now, but I don't think that would make me enjoy sorcery more. No, that's fair. I didn't write sorcery as one of my choices actually. The Light Fantastic I thought was a bit obvious, because it's like again part of the couplet. I mean, Eric is the obvious, isn't it? Eric was my honorable mention. But I feel kind of bad saying Eric because like, it's my least

favorite. Yeah, it's my least favorite Discord book. It's one I, it was the only book we did that I read for the first time for the podcast. And I think I have a bit of a skewed perspective, because both times I've read it, been for podcasting and either, like I was going have a bit of a skewed perspective because both times I've read it have been for podcasting and either like I was going through a lot of weird life stuff when we did Eric and it was just a difficult book to talk about and then we did a very, very late night. I was very tired when we talked about Eric for Desert Island Discworld. I think I'm like overly harsh about it. Yeah, that's it. This is why I'm like, it's the obvious one. I mean, then if I'm going

to be like, properly controversial to you, if I think if I'd started with soul music, I might not have picked up the rest of it so quickly. That's fair. I mean, just because I accept I'm in the minority having it so low down on my list. But I'm like, just I hadn't watched the Blues Brothers. And there's a lot of rock references I didn't get even though I know the fucking bands because my head's just not in that space when I'm reading Discworld. Susan's really not one of my favorite characters. I have to say Susan in soul music, like teenage Susan.

Yeah. Not the most likeable protagonist. I like her a lot more in Thief of Time. Yeah, I think she's well written in Soul Music. I think she's well written as a teenage girl, but she's not that doesn't make her particularly likeable. No. But yeah, actually, yeah, maybe I'd have liked it more if I did read it. I must have read it as a teenager. And I don't remember disliking it. But I don't think I've reread it more than once or twice before we got to the podcast. Yeah. I'm going to put that as my honorable mention. And I'm gonna say, Eric would be an odd place to start unless you're, again, quite a young reader. Yeah. One last thing I will say in defense of Eric is that when we covered it on the

podcast, we attempted a demon summoning to pad out an episode a bit. Niamh – Didn't we? Sarah – I then put one strike to summon a demon on a zoom call in a Dating Out bio. And it was quite a good conversation starter. So I'll say for all the horrible things I said about Eric, it has been helpful in my romantic life in a way no other Discworld novel has been. Niamh – Well, that's fun. Unfortunately, the video quality from that is so poor. I've not been able to salvage it as like a little bonus thing for people because we were doing it stuff before like we'd

bought a proper this was like early pandemic wasn't it? Yeah, this was it was September 2020. All right, early pandemic. We just took quite a long time to get a proper webcam. All right, we just took quite a long time to get a proper webcam. We weren't doing a ton of video content at the time. It was before we launched the Patreon. That was a really funny thing as well, actually. It was fun. I really listened to that episode. We should reenact the Demon's Summoning at some point. I remember it very clearly. I

was rocking back and forth. Oh my god, I accidentally found that like, demon summoning website that really quickly turned neo Nazi. You found one that was neo Nazi. You found one that was turned out to be from Dungeons and Dragons. Oh yeah. Tough to find a genuine demon summoning ritual these days, lads. I know. This is why I've got my little, you know, bookcase full of fucking obscure books now, largely because the internet has been such a hit and miss.

Now we have piles of them to the reference base. Including grimoires, apparently. So yeah, on the absolute worst place to start, one any other media? Terrible place to start with Terry Pratchett's work. What was what's your any other media? I think you can guess mine Joanna. Is it the animated soul music? It's the animated soul music. Yeah. Actually, my answer is specifically episode three of the Cosgrove Hall soul music adaptation.

Is that the one with my favorite catchphrase? FATHER! Just the entire fucking episode flashing back to someone going off a cliff shouting father sorry spoilers but only for the animated version. I can't remember I have blocked out what it actually sounds like because my brain just replaced it with Matt Berry going father. Oh see my brain replaced it with you So it's less annoying than it was. Thanks, I am not a cartoon. Honourable mention for this one as well. From the Discworld, which is a prog rock Discworld themed album by David Greenslayer, which I learned about from a friend of the pod Mark Burrows, his show The Magic of Terry Pratchett. It's, it's not great.

You're not a prog rock fan. It's not great. You're not a prog rock fan. It's got nothing to do with me not liking prog rock. Those are two separate things. But if you must look this up, listener, do look up a wizard staff that has a knob on the end so that you can suffer as I have suffered. Oh, we could be a bit self-referential and self-deprecating at the same time and pick one of our worst episodes couldn't be as like the worst entry point. Oh, yeah.

I'm not sure we could do as bad as a prog rock album. I'm sorry. We have never recorded a prog rock album and I think our listeners should all be very grateful. Yeah. I don't think we get enough appreciation for not releasing an album actually. Of any kind, like prog rock. We can't harmonize at all. We used to be able to.

I know, I don't know what happened. I changed key, you changed key. Now we don't harmonize. Yeah, it wasn't really bad. I mean, again, I kind of go Eric because we just did not have enough to talk about in those episodes. Yeah. Oh, yeah, it's hard to say, isn't it? Because like, going away from accidentally insulting us, you know, we hurt our own feelings very easily. Yeah, I mean, almost all Death Ground things I would

say would capture somebody or another. And that's the way of thing. Like I'd say even like the the witches animation stuff is weird. And I would almost I wouldn't recommend it to many people then. That's weird with a Y. Weird with a Y. But then as I said, the batshit Lord of the Rings animation that never got finished, I absolutely adored as a child. The Ralph Baxter, yeah. Yeah.

And the Cosgrove Hall adaptations do have a similar look to them. Exactly. And the Weird Sisters one is quite fun. Yeah, I'm kind of craning my head to look at. Maybe Nanny Ong's recipe book would be, it's not the worst place to start, but it would be like the most out of left field thing to give to somebody. Like, why are you giving me this book that really feels like it should be explicit but isn't quite? On the one hand, yes. But on the other hand, if I made the Chocolate Delight from Nanny Ogg's book and gave it to someone and then said, I made this because

of these books. And they might propose marriage. I was gonna say that one in particular, I mean, that's quite forward. That is, I wouldn't do that on a first date obviously, I'm a classy bird. Unless I was really trying to get a box at the opera. Sorry for anyone who's listening to this to actually find out where to start with Discworld because that makes no sense without context. But it will one day. When you get there, you'll be delighted. And isn't that exciting? It is exciting.

One last honorable mention, not for any particular category, I guess for non-Discworld, but Good Omens is such a good entry point. Oh yeah. Yeah, I mean. Be remiss if I didn't mention and the TV show as well, I think that's brought so many new people to Discworld. I'd be really interested to know. It's one of those things you can't really track, but I'd love to know how many new readers. And how many stuck with it? If you've ended up here via Good Omens, tell us.

I've got a colouring book up there. Even that I feel like could be a good entry point. Some people are just visual. I'm thinking about my colouring book. I might actually try and colour that in one day. I think I coloured in like half the first page and then realised I'm not into colouring books. But I have a ton of them because they were popular for a while. So people would give me like, oh, you like this thing. Here's the colouring book. I have a couple of like Doctor Who ones and stuff as well. I think I've got a Jeremy Corbyn one.

Of course you have a Jeremy Corbyn colouring book. You might have got it for me. Yeah, no, that's entirely possible. So in summary, Yeah, sorry, fuck. I was trying so hard not to stand it today. That was a tangent et, that was fine. In summary, it doesn't matter really where you start with this world. And thus, this was a waste of an hour of your precious time. Absolutely, no. It doesn't matter where you start as long as you do read them. And at this point, I would like to remind everyone that this is definitely not a cult.

No, but it is compulsory. It is, no, if you've to this, you don't have to read a disco book. But we've given you plenty of options. And we did put some fairly extensive terms and conditions at a frequency too high for the human ear to hear, but they are surprisingly legally binding. So there's that. I think that's everything we're going to say. Is there anything you wanted to say and didn't get to say, Francine? No, not really. How about you? No, I think I've said everything. No, that's not true. I'll think of something as soon

as we stop recording. Perfect. Well, thank you very much for joining us on this little Terry Pratchett Day Odyssey through all the wrong places you can start. And a couple of the right ones. And a couple of the right ones, maybe. I can't play Anytime TV now. In our opinion. We'll be back properly on the 6th of May with part one of I Shall Wear Midnight, which

covers chapters one through five. Absolutely exciting. We are also going to be on Lisa McCormick's weekend program on Five Live Lates, which so this episode is dropping midnight on Sunday. So just before that is live, we're on somewhere between one and five in the morning, we're not sure. The coveted slot. The coveted slot. So we can find something we will link in the show notes to a catch up thing. So I'm sure not many of you will listen to that live but...

No, including me. If you're listening to this at midnight on Sunday and want to go on, go over to Five Live and find us there. Press the red button for more content. Speaking of alienating our Gen Z listeners. Go to CFAQS page. And if you don't know what CFAQS is, look it up in your paper dictionary. Ask Jeeves, he'll know. It'll be next to the telephone book. Anyway, so until you hear us on Radio 5 Live, until we come back next week with I Shall

Wear Midnight, you can join our Discord, link down below, lots of fun chat there. You can follow us on... It's good fun. It is fun. You can follow us on Instagram at The True Show Make You Fret, on Twitter and Blue Sky at Make You Fret pod, on Facebook at The True Show and Make You Fret, join our subreddit r slash ttsmyf, email us your thoughts, queries, castles, snacks.

Tell us where you got started in the Discworld, at thetrueshowandmakeyoufretpod at gmail.com. And if you want to support us financially, you can go to patreon.com forward slash thetrueshowandmakeyoufret and exchange your hard-earned pennies for all sorts of bonus nonsense. Hiya. And until next time, dear listener. Don't let us detain you. FATHER!