Witches Abroad

by Terry Pratchett | Science Fiction & Fantasy |
ISBN: 0061020613 Global Overview for this book
Registered by wingGoryDetailswing of Nashua, New Hampshire USA on 11/10/2017
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Journal Entry 1 by wingGoryDetailswing from Nashua, New Hampshire USA on Friday, November 10, 2017
I got this good-condition paperback at a local Savers thrift shop, and was glad to have another release copy of this wonderful book.

Since first "discovering" Terry Pratchett's Discworld (via the rave reviews of other BCers), I've enjoyed meeting all of his ongoing characters, but until I read this book the witches were among my least favorites [not that I didn't like them - I just liked others more]. But this book is so funny and the witches' characterizations (especially the deadly duo of Granny and Nanny) are so fabulous that I must now rank them right up there with the Watch, and just a tad behind Death.

The book opens with one of Pratchett's quirky dedications: "to all those people - and why not? - who, after the publication of Wyrd Sisters, deluged the author with their version of the words of 'The Hedgehog Song.' Deary deary me..."

From there, as usual with Discworld books, this one's a mix of several main influences - in this case a humorous travelog meets a collection of fairy tales and they wind up going to Disneyworld during Mardis Gras - or something along those lines. Very funny bits scattered throughout, including some laugh-out-louds. It's hard to select favorite bits because there were so many, but a few that spring to mind include the hapless vampire who, in scenes reminiscent of "The Fearless Vampire Killers," is bested all unknowingly by the three witches - and who then encounters Nanny's tomcat Greebo (talk about having a bad day - er, night); there's the magnificent card game on board the barge, in which it is demonstrated that attempting to bluff (and/or cheat) a witch is a bad idea; and there's a marvelous sequence in which we get to see Greebo in an entirely new [and roguishly appealing] light. Oh, and the bit where someone refers to the three witches as "maiden, mother, crone," which leads to a wee bit of jostling for position as the three don't seem to agree on which one of them is what...

There's so much more; I'm sure I missed references all over the place. ("The Wizard of Oz" crops up a lot.) In addition to the humor, though, there's a very dandy plot, with threads woven through the whole story; there are lots of fascinating supporting characters, some of whom I hope I get to meet again in some future Discworld book; there are touching scenes, dark and disturbing ones, and then back we go to the laugh-riot. Typical Pratchett, that, but this really is among the best so far.

This is one of the books that really clarified Pratchett's wonderful "narrative causality" law:

"People think that stories are shaped by people. In fact, it's the other way around. Stories exist independently of their players. If you know that, the knowledge is power.

"Stories, great flapping ribbons of shaped space-time, have been blowing and uncoiling around the universe since the beginning of time. And they have evolved. The weakest have died and the strongest have survived and they have grown fat on the retelling...stories, twisting and blowing through the darkness.

"And their very existence overlays a faint but insistent pattern on the chaos that is history. Stories etch grooves deep enough for people to follow in the same way that water follows certain paths down a mountainside. And every time fresh actors tread the path of the story, the groove runs deeper.

"This is called the theory of narrative causality and it means that a story, once started, takes a shape. It picks up all the vibrations of all the other workings of that story that have ever been.

"This is why history keeps on repeating all the time."


[There's an amusing TV Tropes page on the book, but do beware of spoilers.]

Journal Entry 2 by wingGoryDetailswing at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Southwood Dr. in Nashua, New Hampshire USA on Monday, October 1, 2018

Released 5 yrs ago (10/1/2018 UTC) at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Southwood Dr. in Nashua, New Hampshire USA

WILD RELEASE NOTES:

I plan to leave this book at the entrance of Dartmouth-Hitchcock; hope someone enjoys it!

[See other recent releases in NH here.]

*** Released for the 2018 Spook-Tacular October release challenge. ***

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