I disagree that *Making Money *is a retelling of Going Postal, quite the opposite in fact.
Going Postal is a fish-out-of-water story about a bullshit artist put in charge of a serious, practical institution he does not understand at all and applying his own skillset in a seat-of-the-pants way (and in synergy with the tech know-how of the people he charms over) to solve a Big Issue ; whereas Making Money is a fish-in-water story aimed at demonstrating or lampshading how much concepts of wealth ; value ; currency ; trust in banks ; “scientific” economic models are all ultimately, well, bullshit and cons. Of course Moist can have the financial world wrapped around his finger - he knows exactly how that sort of thing works, and even though he wasn’t born in the Old Money world he can read the people in it and what makes them tick in a heartbeat because they’re dark mirrors of himself.
I think it was actually a city engineer who said that the spinning cubes would be good for “everything”.
But yeah, if Raising Steam had been about the implications of that one little Device, I would have eaten that up with a spoon.
Got a detail wrong. Oops.
Started reading Raising Steam, but couldn’t get into it enough to pursue it. Maybe later.
Just to refresh my memory I reread Raising Steam today at a tournament. It’s not as bad as I had remembered. Still not all that good, mind you. But not Unseen Academicals bad.
I should do that at some point - the only things I remember about it was that some guy invents trains, and Moist is there also ? For some reason ? Like he’s the protagonist out of some form of fiat ? I dunno. I just reread the plot summary on Wikipedia and almost none of it is ringing any bells.
I took a long break at the end of 2019 and most of 2020. Covid-19 actually reduced my reading amount since I stopped going into work and my audiobooks of the Discworld series were my main way of reading them.
I began in-building work again Monday and today, I finally popped a Discworld book back on.
The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents
I attempted the radio play of this at one point and quit. I think I just want to read the actual books first and immediately, I found myself smiling and enjoying being back in Terry’s mind once again.
“What was the point of education, he thought, if people went out afterward and used it?”
I’ll update thoughts as I read it and perhaps get back into the mix reading the rest of Discworld.
Here is my chart of my Discworld reads and my star ratings of them.
Bit of a slow pace for me on this book(Maurice). I was happily enjoying my audio book and I was sent back home to work from home, taking my drive time away. Not complaining, but still.
I got a copy from the library, which is actually a first edition. Very neat hard-cover copy.
I am heading towards the end(Maurice died and met both DEATHS).
I think I love this book; it will end up in my top 10 or maybe even top 5 of the Discworld books. I guess I’m a sucker for a young-adult book like this.
The Amazing Maurice (etc.) is one of my favorites; Pratchett IMO at the very top of his form.
He reaches into the back of your head while you’re laughing and upends a batch of your unchecked assumptions. Pratchett’s good at that.
You might want to leave the last bit till you’re done reading:
And then there’s Dangerous Beans. A weak, half-blind albino rat who believes a story for toddlers is a sacred book. Lots of people could have made a character like Dangerous Beans funny. Some people could have made you respect him. Pratchett makes him funny – and simultaneously makes you respect him. That’s a doozy of a trick.
I like when the Rat Catchers tell one of the rats(or Maurice) that poisoning them was inhumane. “Inhumane? It’s very human. You people do it to rats all the time.”
Finished it today. Yeah, I think it is one of my favorite Discworld books. A really good one.
I’m ranking Maurice 4th out of the 29 Discworld books I’ve ranked. Here are all of them ranked.
BUMP
I have not read another Discworld recently, but I just watched Choosing to Die from Terry Pratchett, a movie about assisted dying for those who have illnesses they can not recover from.
It was extremely powerful and they follow a couple of stories of people who have terminal diseases that will also be very painful and debilitating.
I should warn you, though: They show one man’s death near the end of the movie and Terry Pratchett actually was in the room. It’s incredibly sad and powerful. Pratchett is featured heavily throughout the movie as it is really his own investigation into assisted dying, an option he was considering with his own illness.
Highly recommended, but a tough watch, especially the final 10 minutes of the movie where the death of one subject occurs.
I’m about 85% through Snuff and I have to say, I like it…but I have a question for everyone.
When you read a “City Watch” book, do you prefer the ones with all the Watch or the ones that would be better categorized as “Sam Vines” books? Snuff is a Sam Vines novel with brief appearances from the rest of the watch-crew. Shame since it is the last proper Watch novel and I wanted more of Carrot, Nobby, and everyone else.
I do like the book, though, and will post more thoughts after I finish it. I’ve only read one Discworld the past year due to the pandemic, but I am kind of back on it now.
I found Snuff to be Watchy enough. The rest are involved, somewhat.
Shouldn’t the pandemic have left you with more reading time?
No, it didn’t. I listen to a lot of audiobooks while going to and from work(and elsewhere). I found that during the pandemic, TV and movies went up and reading…at least reading Discworld books went down.
While @Mahaloth is the original latecomer, I just started on Discworld novels about 4 months ago. And not all that deliberately: I had watched the Good Omens series and absolutely loved it, and noted that it was by one of my favorite authors Gaiman, and some hanger-on named Pratchett. I don’t know how or why, originally, but I picked up Small Gods and enjoyed the writing style, the humor, the irreverance. Personally, I don’t think it is the ideal Discworld starter novel, for a variety of personal reasons, though many do recommend it as a beginner; I really loved Going Postal and I think it would be a great place to start. I did read Guards! Guards! pretty early on (second or third) and it really helped fill-in the Watch characters quite nicely.
A quick glance at my phone shows I have 17/41 Discworld novels loaded onto it, starting with Moving Pictures and ending with Raising Steam. These would be the ones I reread constantly. I try to avoid rereading the hardbound copies because a number of them are autographed and personalized.
Time to read Small Gods again!
Many are free to listen to or read on Hoopla, the library streaming service. Check there is anyone is looking for some, especially before you go to Audible.
I count, at least with the licenses as they are by me in Michigan, 21 audiobooks from Terry Pratchett on Hoopla, including Good Omens and Nation.
Mostly Discworld, obviously.
Given my favourite is Night Watch, and then Thud!, I’d say I prefer more Vimes-centric ones, but I like them all.