The Sword in the Loam (Guards! Guards! - Terry Pratchett)

Member Name: andrewl

Product:	Guards! Guards! - Terry Pratchett
Date:	06/07/09 (44 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Very funny indeed, great characters who would become Pratchett mainstays

Disadvantages: The odd duff gag, but it's basically brill

The Discworld: A flat planet carried through space on the back of a giant turtle. Where magic is real, but horribly bureaucratised, and monsters roam the lands, but if they are slain by a wandering hero, their Mums come and complain. Guards! Guards! is an important novel in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series, as it marks the introduction of the Ankh Morpork Night Watch, a group of characters who have all but dominated subsequent Discworld novels.

Carrot, a seven foot dwarf from the mountains (adopted, amazingly enough) sets out with a mysteriously sharp sword and an odd birthmark to Ankh Morpork to seek his fortune in the Night Watch. Unswervingly innocent and honest, he is a breath of fresh air in the Watch, which consists of the simian Corporal 'Nobby' Nobbs, the rotund Sargeant Fred Colon and the unshaven collection of bad habits in a uniform, the alcoholic Captain Sam Vimes. Constable Carrot goes about his policing with unrestrained enthusiasm, and eventually the Watch begins to investigate rumours of a Dragon in the City. But dragons are long gone, aren't they?

With an almost entirely brand new cast of characters (the orangutang Librarian and Death are of course present and correct, as is Ankh Morpork's mild-mannered tyrant, Patrician Havelock Vetinari), this novel moves the Discworld's focus away from the magical world of witches and wizards, and towards more recognisable everyday characters. Dedicated to the hapless guards who are dispatched by grinning heroes in Chapter Five of bad fantasy novels, the Watch are instantly believable and likeable, despite (or perhaps because of) their constant boozing, cowardice, general incompetence and acts of petty larceny.

Pratchett clearly revels in his new characters, and although the plotters bringing back their dragon to restore a King to the throne of Ankh-Morpork is pretty effective, it is the scenes with the Watch slumming around the City and talking to Lady Sybil Ramkin (an aristocrat who runs a sanctuary for swamp dragons) that really stick in the memory. It's fascinating to read the book with hindsight and trace the development of Duke Samuel Vimes back to the pathetic but determined drunk in this novel, but Guards! Guards! is of more than just passing interest, it's one of the warmest and most engaging of the Discworld novels, full of camaraderie, a mature romance and a huge amount of deadly humour. It's probably no coincidence that it was the first Discworld book to be adapted for radio as it's self-contained (although obviously spawned a huge number of sequels with the ever-growing Watch) and requires no knowledge of previous adventures.

If I had a single problem with the book, it's the way in which Vimes begins to quote old films directly towards the end of the novel, confusing his men and irritating this reader. The debt owed to the crime genre is obvious enough without having to be signposted in this way. But this is just a tiny gripe.

Overall, this is a particularly brilliant book from a giant of British fantasy. Expect to pay £7 or £8 in a bookshop, or significantly less from an online retailer.

Summary: A dragon terrorises Ankh Morpork, and it's ragged Night Watch