It took me till I was 30 to finally read a Pratchett, not through any good reason other than I just never got around to it, though at school all my pals tended to rave about them. I did have an inkling what the discworld was about though, and was going to read them backwards (the series not books!) as I splashed out on Unseen Academicals last year which I thoroughly enjoyed. I then found a tattered old copy of Colour of Magic in a second hand book store about a month ago which kind of threw off the whole backwards plan, which I read about a fortnight ago, and so it was still quite fresh in my mind, quite handy that this was the first book chosen. What struck me most was the difference in style, or at least severity of narrative, between the first book and Unseen.
The Colour of Magic seems to explode with many ideas and surrealism which, even prepared as I was, I could see how it may throw off a few readers and at times I struggled to keep pace with what on discworld was going on (The bizarre plane moment sticks to mind). Having said that I soldiered on and found it a very enjoyable read, Im certainly going to move on to the Light Fantastic.
I would definitely recommend reading one of the later books first, if only because it appears his storytelling skills have developed (well based on UA anyway) offering a smoother read whilst taking nothing away from the comedy going on, and I think this definitely helped when reading Colour as I had a better understanding of the universe he had created. I like to think of CoM as a pilot, brim full of ideas and setting the tone and setting for the series to follow. We are essentially given a tour of the disc from one of its major cities, to the very rim, and the various parodies on the fantasy genre which goes on within.
Characterwise I found Rincewind an enjoyable coward, torn as he was with protecting Twoflower to save his own skin, and simply saving his own skin.
His style reminds me a lot of Douglas Adams, which is no bad thing. Overall I found the book an interesting read, and Id definitely say to thems that only managed the first chapter to stick with it as it does reward patience.
As this forum tends not to observe the laws of time or physics I think an every Friday book club may be a bit ambitious, though certainly kicking off a book every so often and setting a discussion period about a week later is a great idea, and I’ll happily chip in from time to time.
Bookwise I’ll probably read just about anything, and it may be worth throwing in a classic now and then since most of them you can find online for free these days, or very cheaply in shops anyway.
