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nestofstraightlines · 4 years

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This week in Discworld editions news...

Three Discworld novels have been given variant paperback covers (UK and US market):

At first glance I wasn’t sure but I think these are a really solid design move. The idea, it seems, is to pick out three entry-point Discworld novels and give them an identity which is quite seperate from the rest of the Discworld editions and aren’t bogged down in genre convention, to invite new readers in.

I’ve long thought something of the kind was a good idea for Discworld. There’s so many DW books, all in quite samey-looking covers (at least the traditional Josh Kirby covers) that it can create an inaccurate/unfortunate impression for browsers: that this is all one series of interchangeable books, that the quality probably isn’t very high across such a long and similar-looking set of books.

These editions feature new intros by some cleverly chosen authors. Neil Gaiman introduces the most overtly high-concept fantasy Mort, gritty fantasy-crime writer introduces Guards! Guards! and classy magical-realism-tinged female-ooriented authoor Joanne Harris introduces Wyrd Sisters. Those feel like recommendations which are going to help these books break out of any genre-geek ghetto they’ve fallen into.

Honestly I think the typography is a bit lacking on the covers, making these feel slightly like cheap e-book covers. but the illustrations are nicely done and cleverly conceived, with the running motif of hands demonstrating the core ‘thing’ of the novel. So good job Transworld! I hope these attract some readers who wouldn’t have thought DW was for them to books they’ll come to love.

I also notice that there’s now a Yiddish-language edition of The Colour of Magic, and that Tansy Rayner-Roberts excellent series of essays on the women of Discworld is available now as an e-book:

Meanwhile Randomhouse have completed thir reissuing of the Discworld novels in hardback covers illustrated by the great Joe McLaren.

For context, slightly involved publishing rights issues meant Gollancz had the hardback rights to the first half of the Discworld series (up to Jingo). They began these reissues back in 2013, then they and Randomhouse, who owned the HB rights to the second half of the series, evidently came to come kind of agreement because after a pause the latter continued with the series of new editions.

The Gollancz part of the run featured very consistent and gorgeous with some absolute stand-outs of concept and execution:

The Randomhouse covers somehow never quite reached the same heights, outside of maybe one or two exceptions. I’d say these are the best of the Randomhouse run, and only Thud! and The Truth come up to the highests standards of those above. I might have said Going Postal too but it massively botheres be that the design isn’t centred! And The Fifth Elephant is fab except I’m not sure it nails the colours in the way the Gollancz editins consistently did.

And just generally the standard was less consistent. The above are great, but the run also indluded these:

Like, it doesn’t necessarily read at this size and on screen but these designs/illustration are so much lower in standard than the rest of the run, it makes me wonder what happened and if it was even McLaren on these or if they ran out of time or something and someone had to imitate his style to the best of their abilities?? Making Money doesn’t even have a title treatment that matches the rest - it’s upper/lowercase rather than all-caps and I’m not convinced that’s even the right font! and every other book in the series has the same lockup and placement of Pratchett’s byline but this one splits it across two lines? Ugh.

Night Watch’s is just... eh, not a punchy illustration and a much hastier-looking illustration style than, say, Equal Rites’ treatment of two figures.

As the illustrator remained the same, the only scenarios I can imagine are: a. the Art Director or Senior Designer at Randomhouse just wasn’t as goood or b. they offered McLaren worse terms - less money/time to work on these

Anyway, it’s a shame because while I had to restrain myself from rebuying the entire series I wanted to get all the Watch books and I just don’t want to spend £10 on that edition of Night Watch.

#Discworld #book covers #Joe McLaren #Terry Pratchett #cover design

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brunhiddensmusings · 4 years

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So I haven't been on your blog for very long but you seem like someone who has a good taste in books. Basically I was wondering if you could recommend some good Terry Pratchett books for people like me who are new to him? (Sincerely someone who has never read a single one of his books but is interested anyway)

okay, theres a great many good books i can reccomend but Terry Pratchett’s discworld novels i can reccomend to basically everyone while still understanding that entering it may be quite daunting because its a complicated question to answer likely, start where i started, with a book thats not even one of the mainline 'paths’ of discworld, has little continuity with any of the other stories, but does a good job of at least touching base on a wide selection of the myriad cast of the world and does an excelent job of at least giving you the FEEEL of discworld complete with stunning artwork The last hero, a discworld fable

after this brief introduction of equal parts humor, philosophy, satire, and gutpunch feels you can make a decision on which ‘path’ of novels to start on next which is usually where people get lost because theres a wide selection of flowcharts that look like a troubleshooting guide for soviet agracultural equipment considering many of them end with “3.0″ or have sections crossed out and arrowed over to the left ill make it simpler, breaking it into introductory and intermediate chunks beginner- which of the following sounds more appealing to you? a retelling of macbeth in a setting where witches act like actual old ladies who get into everyone elses business which repeatedly gets elbow deep in folklore punctuated with light slaps towards shakespear or a crime/detective story set in a city where a troll/dwarf racewar is always on the back burner, the thieves guild and assassins guild are prominent political powers, and ‘wizards did it’ is a legitimate possibility to most crimes if the first is your choice start with Wyrd Sisters (also available as an animated movie but read first as much of the humor doesnt translate well from page to screen), first of the witches of Lancre path... well okay ‘equal rites’ is technically before that but its a more intermediate book you can tackle later. you dont have to immediately read the rest of the witches line unless you feel like it instead of exploring the other paths but they very much have to be read in order otherwise- the order being wyrd sisters, witches abroad, lords and ladies, masquerade, and carpe jugulum before branching off to the tangent tiffany novels Wee free men, Hatfull of sky, and Wintersmith if the second choice appeals more then sit down to Guards Guards, first of the nights watch novels and unlike the witches novels i would highly reccomend going from one to the next immediately instead of waiting till you feel ready to come back and deeply have to be read in order because a lot changes and a lot of continuity happens everywhere that gets deep. the nights watch novels are likely what i would suggest to most readers to start but i also hesitate a bit because it gets heavy in the... heavyness. some of the best detective stories and political commentary out there. the order is Guards guards, Men at arms, Feet of clay, Jingo, the fifth elephant,Night watch, Thud, and Snuff with honorable mention children's book ‘wheres my cow’ intermediate the death novels, by now you will have met Death with a capital D and know he has all the best lines. good news! he has his own path of books with Mort, Reaper man, Soul music, Hogfather, and overlap with Thief of time. it should not be a surprise that these are also on the heavy side, the humor is a bit more dry and dark, but also surprisingly uplifting. if youve ever seen this comic you now know hwere its from

the novel where Death and his granddaughter save christmas equivalant from being destroyed by a particularly cunning assasin plot to destroy the world -good news again, that particular book is available as a movie, and Christopher Lee voices death as is the only correct human possible to even try Monstrous regiment also goes here, its fantastic with deeply political lesbian energies as well as the ‘industrialization’ and ‘moist von lipwig’ path of Moving pictures, The Truth, Going postal, and Making money. these books are where technology and economy collide headfirst with the fantasy setting youve come to know finally the advanced novels better left till after youve read a few of the others here, ironically, we put the first novels writen in the series and introduce whats arguably the most central figure in the setting, Rincewind and the wizzard path with The colour of magic, which shows its age more then the other novels as the world hadnt been finalized quite yet, its also available as a movie thats fairly decent

you will notice DRASTIC changes as you continue the wizzard path with The light fantastic, Sourcery, Faust Eric, Interesting times, The last continent, Unseen accademicals, and circling back to The last hero theres also assorted miscellaneous novels in the discworld that aren't in one of these paths such as Small gods, Pyramids, The amazing Maurice and his educated rodents, and the short story Troll bridge as well as the previously mentioned Equal rites if you want a brief synopsis of any particular book before hunting it down to know if you want to pursue it ill be happy to comply

ook

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