Guards! Guards!
Here there be dragons... and the denizens of Ankh-Morpork wish one huge firebreather would return from whence it came. Long believed extinct, a superb specimen of draco nobilis ("noble dragon" for those who don't understand italics) has appeared in Discworld's greatest city. Not only does this unwelcome visitor have a nasty habit of charbroiling everything in its path, in rather short order it is crowned King (it is a noble dragon, after all...).
Stats for nerds
33recommend
72mentions
55people
2010–2026years
54% recommend44% neutral1% critical
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- Read some mature Discworld content (Guards! Guards! is the best entry point, I'd say), it's an easy read too. Pratchett's skill with English would make even a tax report smooth and riveting.
No need to always flex with some highbrow stuff to find a masterful style.
- So when my kids were little, I read them bedtime stories. They loved the adventures that they got to hear about when I read books like Guards! Guards! And the Dark Elf Trilogy.
Win win baby. They get easy to digest fun stories, and I get to read fun books that I like.
Also, and everyone will tell you this but I can't stress enough how true it is, value your time with them when they're little. It's exhausting, awful, stressful, and seriously exhausting (yes that gets two call outs), but it goes so fast. It just goes so fast. You get into a groove and it's five years later. Then ten. They're only little once, and while that means you should try your best to make sure they have a good childhood - seriously don't forget to enjoy them just for yourself. Be selfish. Snuggle them every chance you get. Hold their little hands. Carry them everywhere. Call in sick to work to play dress up or build a fort or just look at bugs. Skip social obligations to eat popcorn and watch a movie with them. Give them kisses and hugs and be selfish about it. It's for them but it's also for you. A lot of parents forget that.
- The recommendation I've had and am happy to pass along is to begin with Guards! Guards!, which is the first novel where it really becomes evident what Pratchett has to say now he's gotten all the juvenilia out of the way and set to work in earnest.
The series is certainly worth the trouble, though possibly not if you approach it with the expectation of being graded.
- The Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors by James Hornfischer. The amazing courage shown by the US Navy sailors as their tiny 2,000 ton Destroyers and Destroyer Escorts faced a Japanese fleet of Battleships, Cruisers, and Destroyers at The Battle Off Samar. Inspiring and horrifying, the DDs and DEs of the US navy were protecting "Escort Carriers" which were smaller aircraft carriers made from cargo ship hulls. Warning, may inspire you to learn a whole bunch more about world war 2.
And 2 books that sort of go together:
Incredible Victory: The Battle of Midway by Walter Lord, and Shattered Sword: The Untold Story of the Battle of Midway by Jonathan Parshall and Anthony Tully. Read Incredible Victory first, learn about the luck, good and bad, that led to a much-needed victory in the Pacific. Then read Shattered Sword and get a fuller picture of events, especially from the Japanese side. Learn about how hubris and dogma led to the Japanese Navy's defeat. Then learn about how saving face led to history not being accurately told by the witnesses on the Japanese side.
All 3 are great books that are well worth your time.
Others that I've enjoyed:
Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler (near future post-apocalyptic sci-fi).
The non-fiction Liberation Trilogy by Rick Atkinson (more WW2 non-fiction, nice details about North Africa through Italy, then France to Germany).
Midnight in Chernobyl by Adam Higginbotham.
Most Secret War by RV Jones (nerdy, funny history of one scientist's world war 2 experience).
The Discworld City Guard books, starting with Guards! Guards!, by Terry Pratchett. Fantasy fiction satire, hilarious and comforting. Highly, highly recommended!!
Peter F Hamilton sci-fi adventure books: Pandora's Star and Judas Unchained are a duo of great space opera stretching across multiple planets and people. Don't spoil yourself by reading any descriptions of Judas Unchained before you read Pandora's Star. Also by the same author, The Night's Dawn Trilogy: The Reality Dysfunction, The Neutronium Alchemist, and The Naked God. Fantastic big canvas space opera with lots of threads, great world-building, and amazing situations. Both sets of books are highly recommended escapes from reality.
- Wodehouse is a great comparison. I typically suggest people start with “Guards! Guards!”, but the Witches or Night Watch books are both great starting points - Granny Weatherwax and Sam Vimes are probably the most explored characters, followed by Death, Tiffany, and Moist.
If you like “Guards! Guards!” or “Equal Rites”, then go back and start from the beginning. The first two novels are fun, but sound like Pratchett was channeling Monty Python and Douglas Adams. It took a few books before his own voice really shined through.
- I followed the prescribed unofficial Reading Order graphic when I started the series (only 10ish books in), and I've jumped around between all the different protagonists. Color of Magic, Mort, Guards Guards, and the Equal Rites do well enough to show you what the Disc is all about, the absurdity of normalcy, and some of the crazy antics people get into. I think it may be more a matter of what "type" of fiction are you looking for - a constantly terrified Rincewind in a world of magic, a new to the job Mort where no one believes HE is Death, a tired Sam Vimes trying to understand a world that is changing faster than he can keep up, or the witches the reject all the social rules of the land. Really the only one I wouldn't recommend first is Small Gods, but mostly because its very self contained to the Klatchian region while the others are on another continent.
