wit, humor, satire, history
Pratchett's Discworld series is an ingenious, multilayered creation of characters, cultures, and conditions, with liberal doses of humor/wit, common sense, commentary on current affairs, and acute or chronic craziness. Each book stands on its own, although reading the series in the order of publication provides a richer experience of successive tales. In building and resolving his tales, Pratchett creatively diverts from predictable fairy-tale, sci-fi and fantasy threads using eclectic conceptual textures and flavors interleaved. For the conversations, philosophy, and thought processes that Pratchett devises, his books are worth the reading. As an English teacher horrified by the dumbing-down of both schools and children, these well-crafted, thoughtfully researched novelettes delight and enrich. Btw, for readers who avoid "language", these won't offend - his characters rarely use their own otherworldly colorful language. The main witches in his books are primarily sensible types, gifted in country skills and herbal traditions, able to consider repercussions of each act beyond the moment in which it may SEEM like a good idea -- not the angry frog-and-bat vindictive variety. Here, three local witches unite to protect the heir to the throne and his crown until he reaches the appropriate age to take back a stolen country. Pratchett masterfully explores consciousness through all his characters, focusing here on his the three talented witches: the senior witch, Granny Weatherwax, a spinster model of sanity and mastery of the mind; Nanny Ogg, mother of many in a vast family network, highly social; and Magrat Garlick, young, conscientious, working on her self-esteem. With the outside aid of theatrical people, the child is hidden and trained. Meanwhile the usurping monarch is increasingly more beset both with Lady Macbeth-ian psychological troubles for having slain the king, and a Lady Macbeth type Valkyrian wife who pushes him to do it. Throughout the story, we are party to conversations between ghosts of assassinated former kings, learn something of the physics of the Discworld, observe a somewhat compassionate Grim Reaper keeping tabs on the scene, the unfolding chronicle of local color/populace and changes to the kingdom.
