Brett’s Comments (group member since May 30, 2015)

Brett’s comments from the Discworld group.

So far it's Sourcery and Equal Rites for me.

Equal Rites has a good story going until it just sort of falls apart, whereas Sourcery is just a mess. It's the only Discworld book I've read that I'd actually call "bad."

I think Mitali pretty much knocked it out the park.

I have a thing about reading series in order, so that's how I started Discworld. I happened to love TCOM and TLF, but I definitely agree with Mitali's assertion that many of the tropes it parodies are old-fashioned (for instance, I had never even heard of Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser until I found out that Bravd and Weasel were supposed to be parodies of them). So for someone who has read a lot of older fantasy, or who just appreciates broad humor in general, I definitely recommend them, but I think there are better places to jump in.

Adding a bit to how they're not representative of the rest of the series, most of the staple characters of Discworld are either absent or completely different in TCOM and TLF (most notably Vetinari, who's so different from his later depiction that people debate whether it's the same character or not).

When I introduce people to Discworld, I make sure to give them a book that I think has the best chance of hooking them. For instance, I just lent Wyrd Sisters to a friend of mine who loves Shakespeare, and Mort to one last year who loved the idea behind the plot. There's very little continuity in the series, so you don't actually lose much if you read them out of order - I read them in publish order myself, but I tend to recommend the thematic series orders to other readers who are less hardcore about it.