Terry Pratchett's 22nd Discworld novel, The Last Continent, is a lighthearted tour of the fantasy land of Fourecks, a very Australian sort of place, with brief courses in theoretical physics and evolution thrown in for good measure. Pratchett returns to his first Discworld protagonist, the inept and cowardly wizard Rincewind, who habitually runs into trouble as fast as he flees. Rincewind's arrival in Fourecks has distorted the space-time continuum, and he has to sort it out before the whole place dries up and blows away. The situation is complicated because the actual problem is located 30,000 years in the past--just where the Faculty of the Unseen University currently are. Pretty frightening, given "the true wizard's instinct to amble aimlessly into dangerous places," and then "stop and argue ... about exactly what kind of danger it [is]."

If you're baffled by all this, no worries, mate. You needn't have read Pratchett before--not even the five previous Discworld novels starring Rincewind (The Colour of Magic, The Light Fantastic, Sourcery, Eric, and Interesting Times)--to enjoy this latest romp. Nor to have visited Australia. When you finish, however, you'll likely want to rush out and do both.

"I shall endeavor to make study of any primitive grass-skirted peoples hereabouts," added the Dean, with a lawnmower look in his eyes.

"You might...tread on an ant now and it might entirely prevent someone from being born in the future!" "Really?" said Ridcully. "Yes, sir!" Ridcully brightened up. "That's not a bad wheeze. There's one or two people history could do without. Any idea how we can find the right ants?" "No, sir!" Ponder struggled to find a crack in his Archchancellor's brain into which he could insert the crowbar of understanding, and for a few vain seconds thought he'd found one."Because...the ant you step on might be your own, sir!" "You mean...I might tread on an ant and this'd affect history and I wouldn't be born?" "Yes! Yes!" That's it! That's right, sir!" "How?" Ridcully looked puzzled. "I'm not descended from ants."

The bursar was, as he would probably be the first to admit, not the most mentally stable of people. He would probably be the first to admit that he was a tea-strainer.

Regarding a book from Ponder's childhood, one that is separated into three sections so you could make many, many creatures by changing the head, torso and leg pages. "The cover promised 'hours of fun' although, after the first three minutes you couldn't help wondering what kind of person could make that kind of fun last hours, and whether suffocating him as kindly as possible now would save the Serial Crimes Squad a lot of trouble in years to come. Ponder, however, had hours of fun."

A footnote toward the end of the book about meat pie floaters, one of the "indigenous delights" on the Last Continent, goes on and on about how perfectly good food gets mangled by insistence on favoring food that is awful for unknown perverse reasons and Prachett notes "It's as if Machiavelli had written a cookery book." I love that analogy.