The Colour of Magic is the first of the Discworld novels by Terry Pratchett. It was also my starting point for the series. It is shocking, I know, but I’ve never read anything of this series before.
Well, that’s not entirely true. I started reading The Colour of Magic about 10 years ago and found it immensly boring, so I didn’t finish it (I think I got to page 15 or so). But deadra kept reading hilarious excerpts from (other) Discworld novels to me, so I figured I’d give it another shot. And because I have to start a series with the first book, I started with The Colour of Magic again.
The story goes like this: Twoflower is the first tourist ever to come to Ankh-Morpork from the Counterweight continent, his only companion a magic chest made from sapient pearwood, which follows him everywhere he goes and fiercly protects Twoflower. Twoflower is pretty naive and to protect him, Rincewind gets recruited as his tour guide. Against his will. Rincewind is a pretty crappy magician, but through an accident, one of the great eight spells got lodged into his brain. And now it wants to say itself at the most inconvenient moments. But because no one knows what it does exactly, it’s probably not a good idea to do so. Well, Twoflower and Rincewind get entangled in a series of adventures, which are more or less unconnected.
I have to admit, I was a bit disappointed. It wasn’t half as funny as I thought it would be [the TV adaptation on the other hand, is. Even though I always had to remind myself that Sean Astin is actually a normal sized man (more or less) and not hobbit sized. It surprised me every time he got up].
Back to the book. It wasn’t bad and I enjoyed reading it, but I just expected it to be laugh-out-loud funny. And it wasn’t. Expectations can really screw you. I mean, the backstories were great, but the action itself were just average.
Well. I’m pretty sure that the other books are funnier and I do think I will continue to read them. But I think, I’ll follow Death first. Thanks to the great Discworld Reading Order Guide (pdf), I know where I want to go next… and I can always return to Rincewind later on.
kalafudra's Stuff 
I rather liked it, actually. Preferred the Death stories, though, so you might be right to try it, if you’re discouraged.
Aye, give Mort a read. It’s a ruddy awesome book.
I definitely will read Mort. As I said, I enjoyed The Colour of Magic. It was just different from what I expected…
Like in every serie there are highs & lows and some books are much more funnier than others. There are some I can’t read because they bore me so much and others I wouldn’t want to finish. All in all (google says it is the translation for “Alles in Allem”, I hope it is. :D), for the world created and the ideas, the way of thinking of the characters, it is worth giving a try imho (however, it is said the French translation is particularly good here, maybe that helps [and god knows Frech book translations aren’t always that good… *le sigh*].)
Have you seen last year’s aired TV show for Christmas ? I was a bit taken aback as in French it was all about Christmas but in German it was about Sylvester I was all “Uh ?! Santa Claus during Sylvester ?”.
I loved the world, Pratchett created. The whole back story was great.
Do you mean Hogfather? Yeah, I’ve seen it (and I really liked it). I don’t remember the details of the Sylvester thing, but in Austria (and I do think Germany as well, but I’m not sure), we traditionally don’t have Santa Claus in that form anyway. We have St. Nikolaus (who Santa Claus derived from), coming on the 6th of December. Therefore, if you have the Hogfather coming on Sylvester or Christmas, here, both is wrong :P
Oh, and don’t get me started on translations…
[all in all = alles in allem, no problem ;)]
If it’s possible to have a least favourite Discworld character (and associated stories), Rincewind is probably my least favourite. Lancre witches #1, Death #2, and City Watch #3… (And I think that just about covers all of them, doesn’t it?)
We had Hogfather on TV down here last Christmas, it was brilliant (although don’t get me started on Mr Teatime not being quite right, we could be here all day…) and I know a bunch of people who’d never even HEARD of Discworld before who really enjoyed it. There were lots of cries of “wait, you mean there’s books too…?”
*Sighs* Some people! You’d think that unless there was a two-part Channel 7 special about something, it wouldn’t even exist…
Enjoy tucking into more delicious Pratchetty goodness, K!
Thanks, I will!
I know a lot of people who have said the same thing. And even having read none of the books before, I knew about the series and about the turtle and the elephants etc.
People are weird…
Christkindchen or Weihnachtsmann, whoever comes that night doesn’t, usually, come on Sylvester, that’s juste being my point. However I haven’t read the book so I don’t know which mix’n match Terry Pratchett can have done or not. ;) I suppose too much thinking about it will only result in a headache.
Don’t worry, I won’t get you started on translations. In French we say “Traduire c’est mentir”, “translating is lying”. ;D
That’s true, they usually don’t come on Sylvester. But I’m pretty sure that Terry Pratchett has an explanation for it. Don’t you think? :)
Vraiment, traduire c’est mentir! Truer words have rarely been spoken…
I’ll try and email you a list of all the Pratchett books I own, so you can borrow whatever you like.
I also don’t like Rincewind that much.
My ranking would go #1 Watch #2 Witches #3 Death and #4 William de Worde. Rincewind comes in after all the stand-alones, just before Tiffany Aching, I think.
(I realise that you probably don’t know who Tiffany Aching is yet…but I refuse to let that bother me ^^)
Great!
Could you bring me Mort, if you have it, the next time we’ll meet? Thanks!
Of course he’d have. ;D
In French it was Christmas, in German Sylvester, if ever you read the book, don’t forget to tell when it is supposed to be in English.
Okay, I promise I will. And I’m pretty sure that I will read it. :)
[…] novels and the first to deal with the City Watch. [Yeah, I know I said I was gonna continue with Mort, but it seems to be the only Discworld book that deadra doesn’t own, so Death will have to wait… […]