Sourcery

Its Ankh Morpork again and things are as wretched, dirty, disheveled and motheaten as usual. Suddenly a boy wonder (Coin) arrives at the Unseen University. Coin is the eighth son of an eighth son. His father mostly died when Coin was an infant, but he still would make most parents look good by comparison. It is not long before everything in Ankh Morpork is bright and shiny and that is just the beginning of the disaster. Sourcery is a novel of Discworld. The Discworld novels fall into different categories: Tiffany Aching, Rincewind, the three witches, Sam Vines and the guards, and Death. Each book focuses on one of them, although they cross over and pop up in each others’ books all the time. It is best if you start from the beginning of a particular grouping and work your way through, otherwise you’ll miss a lot of inside jokes, references, etc. There are charts on the internet that will show you the groupings. You can trust Terry Pratchett to not be too linear and to not be predictable. Sourcery is an early novel of Rincewind. Rincewind is a wizard with little mastery of magic whose feels that his main talent is staying alive in the background of his surroundings. He is also the master of the luggage. He views himself as fearful and not heroic: in other words, the perfect person to save the world. Like all of the Discworld books, the tone is satirical and clever. This book did not make me laugh out loud like Wee Free Men, but it was amusing. Anytime the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse show up in a Discworld novel, it is seriously humorous. Somehow, Terry Pratchett makes all the nonsense work. If you are someone who cannot smile at puns like martial lore or wizards were wazzards might not fully appreciate Discworld even though most of the cleverness is more sophisticated. Silly farce is also a major force. These books do not contain any scenes, language, or images that would rate even a PG-13 rating at the movies. If a reader does not have sufficient maturity, much of the book will be wasted, because you wont get the jokes or understand the satire. I count myself lucky to still have so many novels of Discworld ahead of me. Terry Pratchett was brilliant and the master of a fantasy sub-genre that probably belongs to him alone. The Tiffany Aching books remain my favorites, perhaps because they were my first, but probably because of the wee free men.

Past the midpoint of my life, I finally started to read the Discworld books. Having loved the first four books, and expecting to like many of the other Discworld novels, I have to say that Discworld book 5 was surprisingly disappointing. It started off rather strong but it certainly ended laboriously. Many of the scenes in this novel drag out as scenes did not drag out in the first books. There are fewer rich, comedic observations. Rincewind is thoroughly tedious in Sourcery. (Spoiler ahead) The Nordic myth-inspired ending (I don’t want to give too many details) as well as those dealing with the Dungeon Dimension were uninteresting and unfunny. I flipped through half-read pages very quickly towards the end in a hurry to finish the story as opposed to reading quickly and thirstily because the story was so good. I found myself basically in a rush to start book 6 on the assumption that it would be better. Please bear in mind that books 1 through five all elicited four or five stars from me. So it’s not as if I’m inclined to not like the Discworld novels. Though I won’t know if this is the case until I have read more of a the novels, I suspect book 5 was just a bit of a stumble along an entertaining 41-book journey. Sir Terry typically wrote about two books a year. They couldn’t all be four- and five-star achievements. I’m well aware that a majority of people who set out to write fantasy of any kind comedic or otherwise never get even close to the enormity of achievement that Pratchett had. Book 5 has its good moments…but too few of them.

Rincewind, the wizard who consistently fails at wizarding magic, is tasked with saving the entirety of his world when an extremely powerful 10 year old sorcerer arrives to claim his throne. Rincewind’s plan? Run away! Run away!

What can I say that hasn’t been said? Rincewind is the kind of hero who knows he’s the wrong man for the job, but somehow fate continues to pick on him. Pratchett has a style that always makes me laugh, and this time, I actually find myself rallying for the poor wizard to overcome his failures. I found this story gave our main character more heart than the ones before it. And the librarian proves to be the story’s soul.

As usual, a wonderfully funny novel from Terry Pratchett. The story focuses around Rincewind, along with a few other recurring Discworld characters, but the story mostly stands on its own and can be read without having followed the entire series.

A young boy with incredible magical ability – and with the direction of his revenge-driven father’s spirit – quickly steps in as the Archchancellor of the Unseen University. However, when his unchecked quest for power upsets the magical balance of Discworld and invites the Apocralypse, Rincewind is unwillingly shoe-horned into saving the world.

(Also features some amazing scenes with Death and the horsemen of the Apocralypse!)

This is a Diskworld novel. If youve read any of them, you know what youre going to get, and if you like the Rincewind ones youll probably like this.

BUT, BUY THE BOOK! I bought the kindle version instead and its got quite a few typos, which Ive not experienced at all in the paperbacks. Its obviously not been properly proofread.

The authors trademark footnote asides are also almost inaccessible on a kindle paperwhite and the difficulty in reading them (on a separate screen) spoils the timing and the moment.

Kindle is fine for some stuff, but not Pratchett.