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376 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published August 1, 1989
"There was a thoughtful pause in the conversation as the assembled Brethren mentally divided the universe into the deserving and the undeserving, and put themselves on the appropriate side."In the end, the only thing that makes it possible to wake up in the morning is just a slight deviation from this depressing state of affairs that leads to the understanding and a bit of dignity and doing what's right - even when that's not quite expected. Because someone has to uphold what's right. Because someone needs to swim against the current.
He shrugged. "They're just people," he said. "They're just doing what people do. Sir."This is one of my favorite Discworld books and one of the best starting points for the Discworld newbies. It is the first book in the subcycle focusing on the City Watch of Ankh Morpork (the Pearl of Cities¹ on the Disc); the book that really takes a look into the inner workings of this crowded, dirty and despicable and yet lovably tenacious urban metropolis:
¹ "Ankh-Morpork! Pearl of cities! This is not a completely accurate description, of course — it was not round and shiny — but even its worst enemies would agree that if you had to liken Ankh-Morpork to anything, then it might as well be a piece of rubbish covered with the diseased secretions of a dying mollusc."In Pratchett's tradition of deconstructing the tropes this one has its kings and tyrants and secret societies and dragons and maidens and heroes and heirs with birthmarks and magical swords, as well as million-to-one chances - except that things tend to not work out as planned. And all of it is woven into a neat tight plot that carries us through the dry humor and slapstick and sad seriousness to the unexpected depth as you allow the cogs and wheels of your brain turn contemplating Pratchett's intentions.
I am a Sam Vimes girl through and through. And this book is our introduction to our cynical (anti)hero, uncompromising, grumpy and terrifyingly sober/knurd ('knurd' as in complete and utter opposite to drunk, beyond simple sobriety) Ankh-Morpork copper with the unsettling tendency to ask uncomfortable questions when others would much rather he didn't.
"If there was anything that depressed him more than his own cynicism, it was that quite often it still wasn't as cynical as real life."
¹ "The city wasa, wasa, wasa wossname. Thing. Woman. That's what it was. Woman. Roaring, ancient, centuries old. Strung you along, let you fall in thingy, love, then kicked you inna, inna, thingy. Thingy, in your mouth. Tongue. Tonsils. Teeth. That's what it, she, did. She wasa ... thing, you know, lady dog. Puppy. Hen. Bitch. And then you hated her and, and just when you thought you'd got her, it, out of your whatever, then she opened her great booming rotten heart to you, caught you off bal, bal, bal, thing. Ance. Yeah. Thassit. Never knew where where you stood. Lay. Only one thing you were sure of, you couldn't let her go. Because, because she was yours, all you had, even in her gutters..."
¹People who are rather more than six feet tall and nearly as broad across the shoulders often have uneventful journeys. People jump out at them from behind rocks then say things like, "Oh. Sorry. I thought you were someone else."And when the city is facing danger, Vimes bit by bit begins to think about it as HIS city. After all, 'Things like that shouldn't be allowed to happen. Not in *my* city.'
¹ "The three rules of the Librarians of Time and Space are: 1) Silence; 2) Books must be returned no later than the date last shown; and 3) Do not interfere with the nature of causality."The threat to Ankh-Morpork is real and quite substantial (), but ultimately it's brought along and fueled by the simple human greed, shallow-mindedness and jealousy, little pathetic mundanity of human existence that Pratchett so nonchalantly and non-preachily lets showcase itself. He, it seems, has an excellent ability of seeing the less-than-pleasant things that make people tick - and still manages to make these sad realizations both side-splittingly and laugh-through-tears funny. And I adore that.
"Down there - he said - are people who will follow any dragon, worship any god, ignore any inequity. All out of a kind of humdrum, everyday badness. Not the really high, creative loathsomeness of the great sinners, but a sort of mass-produced darkness of the soul. Sin, you might say, without a trace of originality. They accept evil not because they say yes, but because they don't say no."
“You had to hand it to the Patrician, he admitted grudgingly. If you didn't, he sent men to come and take it away.”And, of course, some place of prominence is given to the Librarian (the aforementioned orangutan) who (no pun intended) will go bananas if you dare to call him the m-word (). The Librarian who knows how to navigate the L-space, that parallel dimension that exists between every library in the world created because of terrifying power of books.
"Books bend space and time. One reason the owners of those aforesaid little rambling, poky secondhand bookshops always seem slightly unearthly is that many of them really are, having strayed into this world after taking a wrong turning in their own bookshops in worlds where it is considered commendable business practice to wear carpet slippers all the time and open your shop only when you feel like it."-----------------
"There are many horrible sights in the multiverse. Somehow, though, to a soul attuned to the subtle rhythms of a library, there are few worse sights than a hole where a book ought to be."
"They may be called the Palace Guard, the City Guard, or the Patrol. Whatever the name, their purpose in any work of heroic fantasy is identical: it is, round about Chapter Three (or ten minutes into the film) to rush into the room, attack the hero one at a time, and be slaughtered. No one ever asks them if they want to.
This book is dedicated to those fine men."
FABRICATI DIEM, PVNCNever was there a story that rocked so hard than that of Ankh-Morpork and her city guard.