Destination Discworld (The Colour of Magic - Terry Pratchett)

Member Name: Nomad

Product:	The Colour of Magic - Terry Pratchett
Date:	31/07/03 (154 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Very funny one-liners, very likeable characters, plenty of scope in the series

Disadvantages: Slightly rushed feel, lots of ideas squeezed into novel, disjointed, no strong plot

The world is round. I haven't personally travelled it's circumference or employed any other scientific means to prove it myself, but it seems a reasonable theory and appears to makes sense so I'm quite happy to go along with it until a better one comes along. But there was a time, in a less enlightened age, when the powers that be decided that the world was, in fact, flat and that travelling too far in any one direction would result in falling off the edge.

I only mention this because I wonder how they would have reacted if they had also been told that this flat Earth was supported on the backs of four giant elephants who, in turn, were standing on the back of an even larger star turtle known as Great A'Tuin (or Chelys Galactica, to give it it's scientific name). For the residents of Discworld this is not mere conjecture but proven scientific fact.

"The Colour Of Magic" is British author Terry Pratchetts' first foray into the Discworld and was originally published in 1983. It tells the story of the cowardly, cynical, inept wizard, Rincewind. Well. I say wizard but that may not be strictly true. He failed to graduate from Unseen University (due in no small part to the fact that he sneaked a look at the most powerful magic book in the whole land. When he did this one of the eight great spells became lodged in his head, scaring the other magic spells away and refusing to leave) and he now earns a living trading on his extensive knowledge of languages. And he is trying really hard to stay out of trouble.

Discworld is about to receive it's first ever tourist in the form of Twoflower, a naïve, generous individual who appears to believe that everything in the world is an adventure and that his tourist status renders him invulnerable to any form of harm. He arrives along with his Luggage; a case made of sapient pearwood, which transports itself on hundreds of little legs. It is also fiercely loyal to its master, following him everywhere and deadly to anyone attempting to steal from it. I bet there are a few holidaymakers around who could do with one of these.

In an attempt to escape his humdrum life as an insurance salesman Twoflower has set off to explore the Discworld hoping to see dragons, heroic adventurers and a genuine bar fight. He is about to get all that he wished for ... and more.

On arriving in Ankh-Morpeth, Discworlds largest city, he encounters Rincewind and together they unwittingly set out on a series of adventures encompassing gods, sea trolls, dragons who only exist if you believe in them, the edge of the world and, of course, DEATH.

I'm only a recent convert to Terry Pratchetts' manic fantasy world. Despite having bought this book about two years ago and almost reading it on a number of occasions, for some reason I never managed to get further than the first few pages.

But recently I've been in one of my book moods (rather than the movie or playstation moods I usually tend to wallow in) and having read Douglas Adams' "Dirk Gently" books again for the umpteenth time (and if you're interested I've written ops on both of them) I decided I wanted something new but with the same sort of humour.

I remembered that I had "Colour Of Magic", dug it out, dusted it off and got stuck in. And how very glad I am that I persisted this time. I'm now on the fourth in the series of thirty although at the speed he writes them, by you time you reach the end of this op there will probably be another one available.

Many people would no doubt say that you would be better off reading 'insert-random-discworld-novel-title-here' first as it's funnier but personally I like to do things in order, and being the first in the series I found this a great place to start.

The two main characters are instantly likeable and draw you along for the ride very quickly. In addition to these we meet a number of others who, while they may only have a fleeting appearance here, often return later in the series, in some cases in their very own novels. I could go into detail on a number of such characters but I think half the joy is discovering them in the correct manner (i.e. by reading the novels.)

It is a very funny book and there are many throwaway lines that will leave you with a wide grin on your face but it has to be said there is a lack of a decent overall plot. It does, at times, feel like the jokes came first and a story was created as an afterthought to string them together. As a comparison I would again point to the Dirk Gently books (did I mention I've written ops on them? ...ouch! OK, I guess I did) which have clever, engaging stories and the humour is derived from the resulting situations.

It's perhaps worth noting that Terry Pratchett does not write his books in chapters however, unlike the other Discworld novels, "The Colour Of Magic" is split into four parts, although each one follows on from the exact point the previous one finished.

For me the lack of individual chapter had two effects. It does mean that there is often not a good place to finish reading for the day but also it seemed to give the book a sort of rushed feel. For me chapters usually pace the book by taking a break from the main characters to have a quick look at other events that are going on in the story.

In other words it reads more like 'Heroes go here, do this, get attacked by them, go somewhere else, do this ...' rather than 'Heroes go here, do this. Meanwhile this happens. Back to the heroes who are being attacked by ... '

I guess this approach is a bit of a personal preference and although it won?t stop you enjoying the book you may take a little while to get used to it. Of course, this may also be attributed to the fact that being the first (and for all he knew, possibly the last) Discworld novel, Terry Pratchett has tried to cram an awful lot of ideas in. While most work well (Twoflowers' picture box, DEATH, the Luggage) others simply create a somewhat disjointed feeling or are simply covered a little too quickly (the dragons, the brief appearance on an aeroplane in our dimension).

In the midst of the current Lord Of The Rings revival (thanks to the spectacular films) it's nice to take some pretty standard fantasy fare - magic, wizards, dragons, trolls, adventurers - and poke fun at them. I've already made some comparisons with Douglas Adams books (and talking of Douglas Adams, I've written two ops on his Dirk ... Oh, never mind) but if you like that sort of thing it's very likely that you will enjoy this if you give it a chance. In fact come to think of it, the Arthur Dent & Ford Prefect characters from the Hitchhikers Guide series are not a million miles away from Rincewind and Twoflower.

Be prepared for a cliff-hanger ending (of sorts) that gets resolved in the second Discworld novel which is called "The Light Fantastic" A review on that is currently in the works.

As I said "The Colour Of Magic" is the first in the Discworld series and while many have told me it's not the best it is a great introduction to a truly bizarre place. For me the good points far outweigh the bad and the fact that this may not be the funniest of the series simply means that I have more to look forward to in the future. Highly recommended.

Thanks for reading.
© Nomad 2003


Book information
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"The Colour Of Magic" by Terry Pratchett
285 pages, published by Corgi, £5.99
ISBN : 0-552-12475-3

Some websites worth a look
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The L Space Web - http://www.ie.lspace.org/
Discworld monthly - http://www.ufbs.co.uk/dwm/
Terry Pratchett Books - http://www.terrypratchettbooks.com/

Oops
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Finally just a little footnote for anyone who read my last op on Chris de Burgh. Sorry about the word count. I really did try, honest.

Summary: Discworld - Book 1