5 Best and Worst Discworld novels

Pawwed Rig

Best in no particular order
Interesting Times
Pyramids
The Colour of Magic/The Light Fantastic
Gaurds Gaurds
Small Gods


Not a huge fan of the Witches


Love it

Batigol

Best 5
Guards! Guards!
Reaper Man
Night Watch
Carpe Jugulum
Wyrd Sisters


Worst 5
Eric (seemed like an experiment that just never worked)
Moving Pictures
Soul Music
The Last Continent (see this in lots of peoples top 5, for some reason I hated it :pac: )
Pyramids


Has anyone else found the later books alot darker (quite possible from the troubles he faces in real life) ? Reading I shall wear Midnight at the moment and seems (to me anyway) to be alot darker than the previous Wee Free Men stuff and darker than the Discworld also.

Hercule Poirot

The best:

1. Thud
2. Hogfather
3. Small Gods
4. Eric (as a fan of Dante's inferno I loved it!!)
5. The Last Hero

The Worst:

None

johnnyskeleton

Hercule Poirot wrote: »

The best:

1. Thud
2. Hogfather
3. Small Gods
4. Eric (as a fan of Dante's inferno I loved it!!)
5. The Last Hero

The Worst:

None

Good post, but isn't Eric loosely based on Faust by Goethe?

Hercule Poirot

johnnyskeleton wrote: »

Good post, but isn't Eric loosely based on Faust by Goethe?

True, but I've never read Faust, Dante does get a few references though

esme003

usually wee free men series are in the kids section in easons, as opposed to with the rest of his novels, for some strange reason.

Conall Cernach

Best
Sourcery
Pyramids
Wyrd Sisters
Guards! Guards!
Mort

Worst
Going Postal
Making Money
Maskerade
Lords and Ladies
Carpe Jugulum

JD1763

Although I am loathe to list five bad Pratchett books, there are some which are noticeably to the bottom of the pile. But these are firmly overshadowed by the best of his work.

1: Nightwatch - without a doubt my favourite discworld novel.
2: The Light Fantastic
3: The Fifth Elephant
4: Thud
5: Guards Guards - it has a special significance for me.

Worst:
1: Unseen Academicals
2: Going Postal
3: Making Money
4: Pyramids

Morpork

Love Discworld! Can't wait for Snuff next week. Reading Night Watch again now which is my favourite.

My top 5
1-Night Watch
2-Feet of Clay
3-Mort
4-Equal Rites
5-Soul Music

The not-as-good-as-the-others list:
1-Going postal (only book I couldn't finish)
2-Pyramids
3-Colour of Magic
4-Light Fantastic
5-Jingo

As a bouns, one of my all time favourite games is Discworld Noir. It's actually how I discovered the series. Even though Terry didn't write the script (he edited it), it's brilliant. This game needs a re-release on gog.com or something.

me-skywalker

Ive only read 3

Nightwatch, The colour of Magic and Going Postal.

Really loved Going Postal, was the first Terry Pratcheet book I read, easily one of the funniest books I've ever read. I took it for what it was and was immersed in it.
The Colour of magic dragged a bit for me. but I got lore and background of what he was doing with the world.
While the Nightwatch was an absolutely masterpiece, every twist and turn and piece of language and inert relevance I ate up and the book read itself!

I have Thief of Time on my shelf, is it worth a read?

Hercule Poirot

JD1763 wrote: »

Worst:
1: Unseen Academicals
2: Going Postal
3: Making Money
4: Pyramids

Not a big fan Moist von Lipwig eh? I find him to be a likeable scallywag!!

Blackhorse Slim

Ok, I've gone back over all the posts in this thread that actually named their best and worst Discworld novels and added up the scores.

Most Popular;
Night Watch 13 votes
Small Gods 10
Guards! Guards! 8
Mort and Thief of Time 7

Least Popular;
Making Money 8 negative votes
Moving Pictures, Last Continent 6
Colour of Magic, Light Fantastic, Going Postal, Thud! 5

I haven't off-set positive and negative votes, just counted the most of each.
I haven't counted comments like "any Tiffany Aching" or "any Witches book", only books specifically named.

The only books that didn't get any votes either way are Hat Full of Sky and I Shall Wear Midnight - do some people not consider these proper Discworld novels, or not worth mentioning?

It's also probably worth noting that the last 4 books - Wintersmith, Making Money, Unseen Academicals and I Shall Wear Midnight didn't get a single positive vote between them, but 12 negative votes. Has the quality of Discworld novels taken a dive? Are we pinning our hopes on Snuff being a return to form?

The two books immediately preceding them, Thud! and Going Postal, were the most divisive, getting 10 positive and 10 negative votes between them (4 positive for GP, 6 positive for T!, and 5 negative each).

I know this is a very small sample, but it's just a bit of fun!

JD1763

Compared to Vimes, Lipwig has all the personality of a damp tissue. Definitely think he should just discontinue the Lipwig arc and go back to the much more interesting characters.

mikeyboy

It's taken me ages to do this.

My Definitive Top Five (subject to change at no notice)
Moving Pictures
Small Gods
The Truth
Carpe Jugulum
Making Money

Better Than Almost Everything Else But Not Quite As Good As The Rest Of The Discworld (see above)
Thief Of Time
Monstrous Regiment
Men At Arms
Feet Of Clay

RachaelVO

Why have I never seen this forum before!!!!!!! This is a great place

I tried desperately hard to pick 5 tops, but I couldn't cos I really did enjoy all the ones I've read (which is quiet a few). I have to say though, stand out for me

Monsterous Regiment - Loved it, loved it, loved it! So much so I've read it again and again!
MORT! - Funniest book of them all. Had to stop reading it on the train cos I'd start laughing and make an eejit outta meself!

My least favourite, but I did still enjoy it has to be
Unseen Academicals - Funny in parts, in as much as I did enjoy it, IMO it's one of the weakest of them all!

Typh

-Night watch.
-Jingo( so much so that I named a dog after the title)
-Thud.
-The Fifth Elephant.
-Small Gods/Guards! Guards!

Soft spot for the eccentricities and flaws of the Watch.

As for five worst, if I could bring myself to voice an opinion against T.P, I never quite got into the Wyrd Sisters or the Wee Free Men. I simply didn't find them as enjoyable as the others. Love the man as a writer and advocate of his causes.

Ridley

Small Gods
Night Watch
Jingo
The Last Hero
The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents

Those are the five I enjoyed most. I think. Small Gods is definately top though. The Last Hero should be the one adapted for a film. Bit surprised no-one tried to claim it during the original Lord of the Rings movie run.

rattusrattus

Without a doubt, Hogfather is the ultimate best.

johnnyskeleton

rattusrattus wrote: »

Without a doubt, Hogfather is the ultimate best.

Should I ban you for your extremist views?


(only kidding by the way, I haven't gone mad with power just yet).

Pawwed Rig

Blackhorse Slim wrote: »

Ok, I've gone back over all the posts in this thread that actually named their best and worst Discworld novels and added up the scores.

Most Popular;
Night Watch 13 votes
Small Gods 10
Guards! Guards! 8
Mort and Thief of Time 7

Least Popular;
Making Money 8 negative votes
Moving Pictures, Last Continent 6
Colour of Magic, Light Fantastic, Going Postal, Thud! 5

Kind of surprised about the negativity (well not negativity but you know what I mean) towards COM and Light Fantastic. Sure they were rough around the edges and flawed in parts but to use a famous quote "upon this rock I will build my church".

These books are where Discworld was born and shaped many books afterwards.
In later books the fact they were on a disc was pretty irrelevant but in the early ones I loved the guys collecting debris before it falls of the edge of the disc and Rincewind hanging onto a tree after going over.

gufnork

Pawwed Rig wrote: »

Blackhorse Slim wrote: »

Ok, I've gone back over all the posts in this thread that actually named their best and worst Discworld novels and added up the scores.

Most Popular;
Night Watch 13 votes
Small Gods 10
Guards! Guards! 8
Mort and Thief of Time 7

Least Popular;
Making Money 8 negative votes
Moving Pictures, Last Continent 6
Colour of Magic, Light Fantastic, Going Postal, Thud! 5

Kind of surprised about the negativity (well not negativity but you know what I mean) towards COM and Light Fantastic. Sure they were rough around the edges and flawed in parts but to use a famous quote "upon this rock I will build my church".

These books are where Discworld was born and shaped many books afterwards.
In later books the fact they were on a disc was pretty irrelevant but in the early ones I loved the guys collecting debris before it falls of the edge of the disc and Rincewind hanging onto a tree after going over.

I completely agree. Just finished re-reading Colour of Magic and still regard it as one of his best. The Light Fantastic was equally as good and is also in line for a re-read.